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By M. Guizot
Volume 1 (of 6)
HISTORY OF FRANCE 1
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Volume 1 (of 6) 2
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Volume 1 (of 6) 3
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Volume 1 (of 6) 4
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Contents:
EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO THE PUBLISHERS.
CHAPTER I. GAUL.
CHAPTER II. THE GAULS OUT OF GAUL.
CHAPTER III. THE ROMANS IN GAUL.
CHAPTER IV. GAUL CONQUERED BY JULIUS CAESAR.
CHAPTER V. GAUL UNDER ROMAN DOMINION.
CHAPTER VI. ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANITY IN GAUL.
CHAPTER VII. THE GERMANS IN GAUL.—THE FRANKS AND CLOVIS.
CHAPTER VIII. THE MEROVINGIANS.
CHAPTER IX. THE MAYORS OF THE PALACE. THE PEPINS.
CHAPTER X. CHARLEMAGNE AND HIS WARS.
CHAPTER XI. CHARLEMAGNE AND HIS GOVERNMENT.
CHAPTER XII. DECAY AND FALL OF THE CARLOVINGIANS.
CHAPTER XIII. FEUDAL FRANCE AND HUGH CAPET.
CHAPTER XIV. THE CAPETIANS TO THE TIME OF THE CRUSADES.
CHAPTER XV. CONQUEST OF ENGLAND BY THE NORMANS.
CHAPTER XVI. THE CRUSADES, THEIR ORIGIN AND THEIR SUCCESS.
Contents: 7
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Contents: 8
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List of Illustrations:
Ideal Landscape of Ancient Gaul——13
Mounted Gauls——66
Battle of Tolbiacum——144
List of Illustrations: 9
The Project Gutenberg eBook of History of France, by Guizot., Volume I.
He Remained There a Long While, and his Eyes Were Filled With Tears.——255
Notre Dame——310
"The Accolade."——324
List of Illustrations: 10
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Never was I more struck with this two-fold character of history than in my tales to my grandchildren. When I
commenced with them, they, beforehand, evinced a lively interest, and they began to listen to me with serious
good will; but when they did not well apprehend the lengthening chain of events, or when historical
personages did not become, in their eyes, creatures real and free, worthy of sympathy or reprobation, when the
drama was not developed before them with clearness and animation, I saw their attention grow fitful and
flagging; they required light and life together; they wished to be illumined and excited, instructed and amused.
At the same time that the difficulty of satisfying this two-fold desire was painfully felt by me, I discovered
therein more means and chances than I had at first foreseen of succeeding in making my young audience
comprehend the history of France in its complication and its grandeur. When Corneille observed,—
"In the well-born soul Valor ne'er lingers till due seasons roll,"—
he spoke as truly for intelligence as for valor. When once awakened and really attentive, young minds are
more earnest and more capable of complete comprehension than any one would suppose. In order to explain
fully to my grandchildren the connection of events and the influence of historical personages, I was
sometimes led into very comprehensive considerations and into pretty deep studies of character. And in such
cases I was nearly always not only perfectly understood but keenly appreciated. I put it to the proof in the
sketch of Charlemagne's reign and character; and the two great objects of that great man, who succeeded in
one and failed in the other, received from my youthful audience the most riveted attention and the most clear
comprehension. Youthful minds have greater grasp than one is disposed to give them credit for, and, perhaps,
men would do well to be as earnest in their lives as children are in their studies.
In order to attain the end I had set before me, I always took care to connect my stories or my reflections with
the great events or the great personages of history. When we wish to examine and describe a district
scientifically, we traverse it in all its divisions and in every direction; we visit plains as well as mountains,
villages as well as cities, the most obscure corners as well as the most famous spots; this is the way of
proceeding with the geologist, the botanist, the archeologist, the statistician, the scholar. But when we wish
particularly to get an idea of the chief features of a country, its fixed outlines, its general conformation, its
special aspects, its great roads, we mount the heights; we place ourselves at points whence we can best take in
the totality and the physiognomy of the landscape. And so we must proceed in history when we wish neither
to reduce it to the skeleton of an abridgment nor extend it to the huge dimensions of a learned work. Great
events and great men are the fixed points and the peaks of history; and it is thence that we can observe it in its
totality, and follow it along its highways. In my tales to my grandchildren I sometimes lingered over some
particular anecdote which gave me an opportunity of setting in a vivid light the dominant spirit of an age or
the characteristic manners of a people; but, with rare exceptions, it is always on the great deeds and the great
personages of history that I have relied for making of them in my tales what they were in reality—the
GUIZOT.
VAL-RICHER,
December, 1869.
CHAPTER I.
GAUL.
The Frenchman of to-day inhabits a country, long ago civilized and Christianized, where, despite of much
imperfection and much social misery, thirty-eight millions of men live in security and peace, under laws equal
for all and efficiently upheld. There is every reason to nourish great hopes of such a country, and to wish for it
more and more of freedom, glory, and prosperity; but one must be just towards one's own times, and estimate
at their true value advantages already acquired and progress already accomplished. If one were suddenly
carried twenty or thirty centuries backward, into the midst of that which was then called Gaul, one would not
recognize France. The same mountains reared their heads; the same plains stretched far and wide; the same
rivers rolled on their course. There is no alteration in the physical formation of the country; but its aspect was
very different. Instead of the fields all trim with cultivation, and all covered with various produce, one would
see inaccessible morasses and vast forests, as yet uncleared, given up to the chances of primitive vegetation,
peopled with wolves and bears, and even the urns, or huge wild ox, and with elks, too—a kind of beast
that one finds no longer nowadays, save in the colder regions of north-eastern Europe, such as Lithuania and
Courland. Then wandered over the champaign great herds of swine, as fierce almost as wolves, tamed only so
far as to know the sound of their keeper's horn. The better sort of fruits and of vegetables were quite unknown;
they were imported into Gaul—the greatest part from Asia, a portion from Africa and the islands of the
Mediterranean; and others, at a later period, from the New World. Cold and rough was the prevailing
temperature. Nearly every winter the rivers froze sufficiently hard for the passage of cars. And three or four
centuries before the Christian era, on that vast territory comprised between the ocean, the Pyrenees, the
Mediterranean, the Alps, and the Rhine, lived six or seven millions of men a bestial life, enclosed in dwellings
dark and low, the best of them built of wood and clay, covered with branches or straw, made in a single round
piece, open to daylight by the door alone, and confusedly heaped together behind a rampart, not inartistically
composed of timber, earth, and stone, which surrounded and protected what they were pleased to call a town.
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Of even such towns there were scarcely any as yet, save in the most populous and least uncultivated portion of
Gaul; that is to say, in the southern and eastern regions, at the foot of the mountains of Auvergne and the
Cevennes, and along the coasts of the Mediterranean. In the north and the west were paltry hamlets, as
transferable almost as the people themselves; and on some islet amidst the morasses, or in some hidden recess
of the forest, were huge intrenchments formed of the trees that were felled, where the population, at the first
sound of the war-cry, ran to shelter themselves with their flocks and all their movables. And the war-cry was
often heard: men living grossly and idly are very prone to quarrel and fight. Gaul, moreover, was not occupied
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by one and the same nation, with the same traditions and the same chiefs. Tribes very different in origin,
habits, and date of settlement, were continually disputing the territory. In the south were Iberians or
Aquitanians, Phoenicians and Greeks; in the north and north-west, Kymrians or Belgians; everywhere else,
Gauls or Celts, the most numerous settlers, who had the honor of giving their name to the country. Who were
the first to come, then? and what was the date of the first settlement? Nobody knows. Of the Greeks alone
does history mark with any precision the arrival in southern Gaul. The Phoenicians preceded them by several
centuries; but it is impossible to fix any exact time. The information is equally vague about the period when
the Kymrians invaded the north of Gaul. As for the Gauls and the Iberians, there is not a word about their first
entrance into the country, for they are discovered there already at the first appearance of the country itself in
the domain of history.
The Iberians, whom Roman writers call Aquitanians, dwelt at the foot of the Pyrenees, in the territory
comprised between the mountains, the Garonne, and the ocean. They belonged to the race which, under the
same appellation, had peopled Spain; but by what route they came into Gaul is a problem which we cannot
solve. It is much the same in tracing the origin of every nation, for in those barbarous times men lived and
died without leaving any enduring memorial of their deeds and their destinies; no monuments; no writings;
just a few oral traditions, perhaps, which are speedily lost or altered. It is in proportion as they become
enlightened and civilized, that men feel the desire and discover the means of extending their memorial far
beyond their own lifetime. That is the beginning of history, the offspring of noble and useful sentiments,
which cause the mind to dwell upon the future, and to yearn for long continuance; sentiments which testify to
the superiority of man over all other creatures living upon our earth, which foreshadow the immortality of the
soul, and which are warrant for the progress of the human race by preserving for the generations to come what
has been done and learned by the generations that disappear.
By whatever route and at whatever epoch the Iberians came into the south-west of Gaul, they abide there still
in the department of the Lower Pyrenees, under the name of Basques; a people distinct from all its neighbors
in features, costume, and especially language, which resembles none of the present languages of Europe,
contains many words which are to be found in the names of rivers, mountains, and towns of olden Spain, and
which presents a considerable analogy to the idioms, ancient and modern, of certain peoples of northern
Africa. The Phoenicians did not leave, as the Iberians did, in the south of France distinct and
well-authenticated descendants. They had begun about 1100 B.C. to trade there. They went thither in search of
furs, and gold and silver, which were got either from the sand of certain rivers, as for instance the Allege (in
Latin Aurigera), or from certain mines of the Alps, the Cevennes, and the Pyrenees; they brought in exchange
stuffs dyed with purple, necklaces and rings of glass, and, above all, arms and wine; a trade like that which is
nowadays carried on by the civilized peoples of Europe with the savage tribes of Africa and America. For the
purpose of extending and securing their commercial expeditions, the Phoenicians founded colonies in several
parts of Gaul, and to them is attributed the earliest origin of Nemausus (Nimes), and of Alesia, near Semur.
But, at the end of three or four centuries, these colonies fell into decay; the trade of the Phoenicians was
withdrawn from Gaul, and the only important sign it preserved of their residence was a road which, starting
from the eastern Pyrenees, skirted the Gallic portion of the Mediterranean, crossed the Alps by the pass of
Tenda, and so united Spain, Gaul, and Italy. After the withdrawal of the Phoenicians this road was kept up and
repaired, at first by the Greeks of Marseilles, and subsequently by the Romans.
As merchants and colonists, the Greeks were, in Gaul, the successors of the Phoenicians, and Marseilles was
one of their first and most considerable colonies. At the time of the Phoenicians' decay in Gaul, a Greek
people, the Rhodians, had pushed their commercial enterprises to a great distance, and, in the words of the
ancient historians, held the empire of the sea. Their ancestors had, in former times, succeeded the Phoenicians
in the island of Rhodes, and they likewise succeeded them in the south of Gaul, and founded, at the mouth of
the Rhone, a colony called Rhodanusia or Rhoda, with the same name as that which they had already founded
on the north-east coast of Spain, and which is nowadays the town of Rosas, in Catalonia. But the importance
of the Rhodians on the southern coast of Gaul was short-lived. It had already sunk very low in the year 600
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B.C., when Euxenes, a Greek trader, coming from Phocea, an Ionian town of Asia Minor, to seek his fortune,
landed from a bay eastward of the Rhone. The Segobrigians, a tribe of the Gallic race, were in occupation of
the neighboring country. Nann, their chief, gave the strangers kindly welcome, and took them home with him
to a great feast which he was giving for his daughter's marriage, who was called Gyptis, according to some,
and Petta, according to other historians. A custom which exists still in several cantons of the Basque country,
and even at the centre of France in Morvan, a mountainous district of the department of the Nievre, would that
the maiden should appear only at the end of the banquet, and holding in her hand a filled wine-cup, and that
the guest to whom she should present it should become the husband of her choice. By accident, or quite
another cause, say the ancient legends, Gyptis stopped opposite Euxenes, and handed him the cup. Great was
the surprise, and, probably, anger amongst the Gauls who were present. But Nann, believing he recognized a
commandment from his gods, accepted the Phocean as his son-in-law, and gave him as dowry the bay where
he had landed, with some cantons of the territory around. Euxenes, in gratitude, gave his wife the Greek name
of Aristoxena (that is, "the best of hostesses"), sent away his ship to Phocea for colonists, and, whilst waiting
for them, laid in the centre of the bay, on a peninsula hollowed out harbor-wise, towards the south, the
foundations of a town, which he called Massilia—thence Marseilles.
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Scarcely a year had elapsed when Euxenes' ship arrived from Phocea, and with it several galleys, bringing
colonists full of hope, and laden with provisions, utensils, arms, seeds, vine-cuttings, and olive-cuttings, and,
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moreover, a statue of Diana, which the colonists had gone to fetch from the celebrated temple of that goddess
at Ephesus, and which her priestess, Aristarche, accompanied to its new country.
The activity and prosperity of Marseilles, both within and without, were rapidly developed. She carried her
commerce wherever the Phoenicians and the Rhodians had marked out a road; she repaired their forts; she
took to herself their establishments; and she placed on her medals, to signify dominion, the rose, the emblem
of Rhodes, beside the lion of Marseilles. But Nann, the Gallic chieftain, who had protected her infancy, died;
and his son, Conran, shared the jealousy felt by the Segobrigians and the neighboring peoplets towards the
new corners. He promised and really resolved to destroy the new city. It was the time of the flowering of the
vine, a season of great festivity amongst the Ionian Greeks, and Marseilles thought solely of the preparations
for the feast. The houses and public places were being decorated with branches and flowers. No guard was set;
no work was done. Conran sent into the town a number of his men, some openly, as if to take part in the
festivities, others hidden at the bottom of the cars which conveyed into Marseilles the branches and foliage
from the outskirts. He himself went and lay in ambush in a neighboring glen, with seven thousand men, they
say, but the number is probably exaggerated, and waited for his emissaries to open the gates to him during the
night. But once more a woman, a near relation of the Gallic chieftain, was the guardian angel of the Greeks,
and revealed the plot to a young man of Marseilles, with whom she was in love. The gates were immediately
shut, and so many Segobrigians as happened to be in the town were massacred. Then, when night came on,
the inhabitants, armed, went forth to surprise Conran in the ambush where he was awaiting the moment to
surprise them. And there he fell with all his men.
Delivered as they were from this danger, the Massilians nevertheless remained in a difficult and disquieting
situation. The peoplets around, in coalition against them, attacked them often, and threatened them
incessantly. But whilst they were struggling against these embarrassments, a grand disaster, happening in the
very same spot whence they had emigrated half a century before, was procuring them a great accession of
strength and the surest means of defence. In the year 542 B.C., Phocea succumbed beneath the efforts of
Cyrus, King of Persia, and her inhabitants, leaving to the conqueror empty streets and deserted houses, took to
their ships in a body, to transfer their homes elsewhere. A portion of this floating population made straight for
Marseilles; others stopped at Corsica, in the harbor of Alalia, another Phocean colony. But at the end of five
years they too, tired of piratical life and of the incessant wars they had to sustain against the Carthaginians,
quitted Corsica, and went to rejoin their compatriots in Gaul.
Thenceforward Marseilles found herself in a position to face her enemies. She extended her walls all round
the bay, and her enterprises far away. She founded on the southern coast of Gaul and on the eastern coast of
Spain, permanent settlements, which are to this day towns: eastward of the Rhone, Hercules' harbor,
Moncecus (Monaco), Niccea (Nice), Antipolis (Antibes); westward, Heraclea Cacabaria (Saint-Gilles),
Agaththae (Agdevall), Emporia; (Ampurias in Catalonia), &c., &c. In valley of the Rhone, several towns of
the Gauls, Cabellio were (Cavaili like on), Greek Avenio (Avignon), Arelate (Arles), for instance, colonies, so
great there was the number of travellers or established merchants who spoke Greek. With this commercial
activity Marseilles united intellectual and scientific activity; her grammarians were among the first to revise
and annotate the poems of Homer; and bold travellers from Marseilles, Euthymenes and Pytheas by name,
cruised, one along the western coast of Africa beyond the Straits of Gibraltar, and the other the southern and
western coasts of Europe, from the mouth of the Tanais (Don), in the Black Sea, to the latitudes and perhaps
into the interior of the Baltic. They lived, both of them, in the second half of the fourth century B.C., and they
wrote each a Periplus, or tales of their travels, which have unfortunately been almost entirely lost.
But whatever may have been her intelligence and activity, a single town situated at the extremity of Gaul and
peopled with foreigners could have but little influence over so vast a country and its inhabitants. At first
civilization is very hard and very slow; it requires many centuries, many great events, and many years of toil
to overcome the early habits of a people, and cause them to exchange the pleasures, gross indeed, but
accompanied with the idleness and freedom of barbarian life, for the toilful advantages of a regulated social
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condition. By dint of foresight, perseverance, and courage, the merchants of Marseilles and her colonies
crossed by two or three main lines the forests, morasses, and heaths through the savage tribes of Gauls, and
there effected their exchanges, but to the right and left they penetrated but a short distance. Even on their main
lines their traces soon disappeared; and at the commercial settlements which they established here and there
they were often far more occupied in self-defence than in spreading their example. Beyond a strip of land of
uneven breadth, along the Mediterranean, and save the space peopled towards the south-west by the Iberians,
the country, which received its name from the former of the two, was occupied by the Gauls and the
Kymrians; by the Gauls in the centre, south-east and east, in the highlands of modern France, between the
Alps, the Vosges, the mountains of Auvergne and the Cevennes; by the Kymrians in the north, north-west,
and west, in the lowlands, from the western boundary of the Gauls to the ocean.
Whether the Gauls and the Kymrians were originally of the same race, or at least of races closely connected;
whether they were both anciently comprised under the general name of Celts; and whether the Kymrians, if
they were not of the same race as the Gauls, belonged to that of the Germans, the final conquerors of the
Roman empire, are questions which the learned have been a long, long while discussing without deciding. The
only facts which seem to be clear and certain are the following.
The ancients for a long while applied without distinction the name of Celts to the peoples who lived in the
west and north of Europe, regardless of precise limits, language, or origin. It was a geographical title
applicable to a vast but ill-explored territory, rather than a real historical name of race or nation. And so, in the
earliest times, Gauls, Germans, Bretons, and even Iberians, appear frequently confounded under the name of
Celts, peoples of Celtica.
Little by little this name is observed to become more restricted and more precise. The Iberians of Spain are the
first to be detached; then the Germans. In the century preceding the Christian era, the Gauls, that is, the
peoples inhabiting Gaul, are alone called Celts. We begin even to recognize amongst them diversities of race,
and to distinguish the Iberians of Gaul, alias Aquitanians, and the Kymrians or Belgians from the Gauls, to
whom the name of Celts is confined. Sometimes even it is to a confederation of certain Gallic tribes that the
name Specially applies. However it be, the Gauls appear to have been the first inhabitants of western Europe.
In the most ancient historical memorials they are found there, and not only in Gaul, but in Great Britain, in
Ireland, and in the neighboring islets. In Gaul, after a long predominance, they commingled with other races
to form the French nation. But, in this commingling numerous traces of their language, monuments, manners,
and names of persons and places, survived and still exist, especially to the east and south—cast, in local
customs and vernacular dialects. In Ireland, in the highlands of Scotland, in the Hebrides and the Isle of Man,
Gauls (Gaels) still live under their primitive name. There we still have the Gaelic race and tongue, free, if not
from any change, at least from absorbent fusion.
From the seventh to the fourth century B.C., a new population spread over Gaul, not at once, but by a series of
invasions, of which the two principal took place at the two extremes of that epoch. They called themselves
Kymrians or Kimrians, whence the Romans made Cimbrians, which recalls Cimmerii or Cimmerians, the
name of a people whom the Greeks placed on the western bank of the Black Sea and in the Cimmerian
peninsula, called to this day Crimea. During these irregular and successively repeated movements of
wandering populations, it often happened that tribes of different races met, made terms, united, and finished
by amalgamation under one name. All the peoples that successively invaded Europe, Gauls, Kymrians,
Germans, belonged at first, in Asia, whence they came, to a common stern; the diversity of their languages,
traditions, and manners, great as it already was at the time of their appearance in the West, was the work of
time and of the diverse circumstances in the midst of which they had lived; but there always remained
amongst them traces of a primitive affinity which allowed of sudden and frequent comings, amidst their
tumultuous dispersion.
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The Kymrians, who crossed the Rhine and flung themselves into northern Gaul towards the middle of the
fourth century B.C., called themselves Bolg, or Belg, or Belgians, a name which indeed is given to them by
Roman writers, and which has remained that of the country they first invaded. They descended southwards, to
the banks of the Seine and the Marne. There they encountered the Kymrians of former invasions, who not
only had spread over the country comprised between the Seine and the Loire, to the very heart of the
peninsula bordered by the latter river, but had crossed the sea, and occupied a portion of the large island
opposite Gaul, crowding back the Gauls, who had preceded them, upon Ireland and the highlands of Scotland.
It was from one of these tribes and its chieftain, called Pryd or Prydain, Brit or Britain, that Great Britain and
Brittany in France received the name which they have kept.
Each of these races, far from forming a single people bound to the same destiny and under the same
chieftains, split into peoplets, more or less independent, who foregathered or separated according to the shifts
of circumstances, and who pursued, each on their own account and at their own pleasure, their fortunes or
their fancies. The Ibero-Aquitanians numbered twenty tribes; the Gauls twenty-two nations; the original
Kymrians, mingled with the Gauls between the Loire and the Garonne, seventeen; and the Kymro-Belgians
twenty-three. These sixty-two nations were subdivided into several hundreds of tribes; and these petty
agglomerations were distributed amongst rival confederations or leagues, which disputed one with another the
supremacy over such and such a portion of territory. Three grand leagues existed amongst the Gauls; that of
the Arvernians, formed of peoplets established in the country which received from them the name of
Auvergne; that of the AEduans, in Burgundy, whose centre was Bibracte (Autun); and that of the Sequanians,
in Franche-Comte, whose centre was Vesontio (Besancon). Amongst the Kymrians of the West, the Armoric
league bound together the tribes of Brittany and lower Normandy. From these alliances, intended to group
together scattered forces, sprang fresh passions or interests, which became so many fresh causes of discord
and hostility. And, in these divers-agglomerations, government was everywhere almost equally irregular and
powerless to maintain order or found an enduring state. Kymrians, Gauls, or Iberians were nearly equally
ignorant, improvident, slaves to the shiftings of their ideas and the sway of their passions, fond of war and
idleness and rapine and feasting, of gross and savage pleasures. All gloried in hanging from the breast-gear of
their horses, or nailing to the doors of their houses, the heads of their enemies. All sacrificed human victims to
their gods; all tied their prisoners to trees, and burned or flogged them to death; all took pleasure in wearing
upon their heads or round their arms, and depicting upon their naked bodies, fantastic ornaments, which gave
them a wild appearance. An unbridled passion for wine and strong liquors was general amongst them: the
traders of Italy, and especially of Marseilles, brought supplies into every part of Gaul; from interval to interval
there were magazines established, whither the Gauls flocked to sell for a flask of wine their furs, their grain,
their cattle, their slaves. "It was easy," says an ancient historian, "to get the Ganymede for the liquor." Such
are the essential characteristics of barbaric life, as they have been and as they still are at several points of our
globe, amongst people of the same grade in the scale of civilization. They existed in nearly an equal degree
amongst the different races of ancient Gaul, whose resemblance was rendered much stronger thereby than
their diversity in other respects by some of their customs, traditions, or ideas.
In their case, too, there is no sign of those permanent demarcations, those rooted antipathies, and that
impossibility of unity which are observable amongst peoples whose original moral condition is really very
different. In Asia, Africa, and America, the English, the Dutch, the Spanish, and the French have been and are
still in frequent contact with the natives of the country—Hindoos, Malays, Negroes, and Indians; and,
in spite of this contact, the races have remained widely separated one from another. In ancient Gaul not only
did Gauls, Kymrians, and Iberians live frequently in alliance and almost intimacy, but they actually
commingled and cohabited without scruple on the same territory. And so we find in the midst of the Iberians,
towards the mouth of the Garonne, a Gallic tribe, the Viviscan Biturigians, come from the neighborhood of
Bourges, where the bulk of the nation was settled: they had been driven thither by one of the first invasions of
the Kymrians, and peaceably taken root there; Burdigaia, afterwards Bordeaux, was the chief settlement of
this tribe, and even then a trading-place between the Mediterranean and the ocean. A little farther on, towards
the south, a Kymrian tribe, the Bolans, lived isolated from its race, in the waste-lands of the Iberians,
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extracting the resin from the pines which grew in that territory. To the south-west, in the country situated
between the Garonne, the eastern Pyrenees, the Cevennes, and the Rhone, two great tribes of Kymro-Belgians,
the Bolg, Volg, Volk, or Voles, Arecomican and Tectosagian, came to settle, towards the end of the fourth
century B. C., in the midst of the Iberian and Gallic peoplets; and there is nothing to show that the new
comers lived worse with their neighbors than the latter had previously lived together.
It is evident that amongst all these peoplets, whatever may have been their diversity of origin, there was
sufficient similitude of social condition and manners to make agreement a matter neither very difficult nor
very long to accomplish.
On the other hand, and as a natural consequence, it was precarious and often of short duration: Iberian, Gallic,
or Kymrian as they might be, these peoplets underwent frequent displacements, forced or voluntary, to escape
from the attacks of a more powerful neighbor; to find new pasturage; in consequence of internal dissension;
or, perhaps, for the mere pleasure of warfare and running risks, and to be delivered from the tediousness of a
monotonous life. From the earliest times to the first century before the Christian era, Gaul appears a prey to
this incessant and disorderly movement of the population; they change settlement and neighborhood;
disappear from one point and reappear at another; cross one another; avoid one another; absorb and are
absorbed. And the movement was not confined within Gaul; the Gauls of every race went, sometimes in very
numerous hordes, to seek far away plunder and a settlement. Spain, Italy, Germany, Greece, Asia Minor, and
Africa have been in turn the theatre of those Gallic expeditions which entailed long wars, grand displacements
of peoples, and sometimes the formation of new nations. Let us make a slight acquaintance with this outer
history of the Gauls; for it is well worth while to follow them a space upon their distant wanderings. We will
then return to the soil of France, and concern ourselves only with what has passed within her boundaries.
CHAPTER I.GAUL. 21
The Project Gutenberg eBook of History of France, by Guizot., Volume I.
CHAPTER II.
A century afterwards other Gallic hordes, descending in like manner upon Italy, had commenced building
houses and tilling fields along the Adriatic, on the territory where afterwards was Aquileia. The Roman Senate
decreed that their settlement should be opposed, and that they should be summoned to give up their
implements and even their arms. Not being in a position to resist, the Gauls sent representatives to Rome.
They, being introduced into the Senate, said, "The multitude of people in Gaul, the want of lands, and
necessity forced us to cross the Alps to seek a home. We saw plains uncultivated and uninhabited. We settled
there without doing any one harm. . . . We ask nothing but lands. We will live peacefully on them under the
Again, a century later, or thereabouts, some Gallic Kymrians, mingled with Teutons or Germans, said also to
the Roman Senate, "Give us a little land as pay, and do what you please with our hands and weapons."
Want of room and means of subsistence have, in fact, been the principal causes which have at all times thrust
barbarous people, and especially the Gauls, out of their fatherland. An immense extent of country is required
for indolent hordes who live chiefly upon the produce of the chase and of their flocks; and when there is no
longer enough of forest or pasturage for the families that become too numerous, there is a swarm from the
hive, and a search for livelihood elsewhere. The Gauls emigrated in every direction. To find, as they said,
rivers and lands, they marched from north to south, and from east to west. They crossed at one time the Rhine,
at another the Alps, at another the Pyrenees. More than fifteen centuries B.C. they had already thrown
themselves into Spain, after many fights, no doubt, with the Iberians established between the Pyrenees and the
Garonne. They penetrated north-westwards to the northern point of the Peninsula, into the province which
received from them and still bears the name of Galicia; south-eastwards to the southern point, between the
river Anas (nowadays Guadiana) and the ocean, where they founded a Little Celtica; and centrewards and
southwards from Castile to Andalusia, where the amalgamation of two races brought about the creation of a
new people, that found a place in history as Celtiberians. And twelve centuries after those events, about 220
B.C., we find the Gallic peoplet, which had planted itself in the south of Portugal, energetically defending its
independence against the neighboring Carthaginian colonies. Indortius, their chief, conquered and taken
prisoner, was beaten with rods and hung upon the cross, in the sight of his army, after having had his eyes put
out by command of Hamilcar-Barca, the Carthaginian general; but a Gallic slave took care to avenge him by
assassinating, some years after, at a hunting-party, Hasdrubal, son-in-law of Hamilcar, who had succeeded to
the command. The slave was put to the torture; but, indomitable in his hatred, he died insulting the Africans.
A little after the Gallic invasion of Spain, and by reason perhaps of that very movement, in the first half of the
fourteenth century B.C., another vast horde of Gauls, who called themselves Anahra, Ambra, Ambrons, that
is, "braves," crossed the Alps, occupied northern Italy, descended even to the brink of the Tiber, and conferred
the name of Ambria or Umbria on the country where they founded their dominion. If ancient accounts might
be trusted, this dominion was glorious and flourishing, for Umbria numbered, they say, three hundred and
fifty-eight towns; but falsehood, according to the Eastern proverb, lurks by the cradle of nations. At a much
later epoch, in the second century B.C., fifteen towns of Liguria contained altogether, as we learn from Livy,
but twenty thousand souls. It is plain, then, what must really have been— even admitting their
existence—the three hundred and fifty-eight towns of Umbria. However, at the end of two or three
centuries, this Gallic colony succumbed beneath the superior power of the Etruscans, another set of invaders
from eastern Europe, perhaps from the north of Greece, who founded in Italy a mighty empire. The Umbrians
or Ambrons were driven out or subjugated. Nevertheless some of their peoplets, preserving their name and
manners, remained in the mountains of upper Italy, where they were to be subsequently discovered by fresh
and more celebrated Gallic invasions.
Those just spoken of are of such antiquity and obscurity, that we note their place in history without being able
to say how they came to fill it. It is only with the sixth century before our era that we light upon the really
historical expeditions of the Gauls away from Gaul, those, in fact, of which we may follow the course and
estimate the effects.
Towards the year 587 B.C., almost at the very moment when the Phoceans had just founded Marseilles, two
great Gallic hordes got in motion at the same time, and crossed, one the Rhine, the other the Alps, making one
for Germany, the other for Italy. The former followed the course of the Danube and settled in Illyria, on the
right bank of the river. It is too much, perhaps, to say that they settled; the greater part of them continued
wandering and fighting, sometimes amalgamating with the peoplets they encountered, sometimes chasing
them and exterminating them, whilst themselves were incessantly pushed forward by fresh bands coming also
"We fear nought," they answered, "unless it be the fall of heaven; but we set above everything the friendship
of a man like thee." "The Celts are proud," said Alexander to his Macedonians; and he promised them his
friendship. On the death of Alexander, the Gauls, as mercenaries, entered, in Europe and Asia, the service of
the kings who had been his generals. Ever greedy, fierce, and passionate, they were almost equally dangerous
as auxiliaries and as neighbors. Antigonus, King of Macedonia, was to pay the band he had enrolled a gold
piece a head. They brought their wives and children with them, and at the end of the campaign they claimed
pay for their following as well as for themselves: "We were promised," said they, "a gold piece a head for
each Gaul; and these are also Gauls."
Before long they tired of fighting the battles of another; their power accumulated; fresh hordes, in great
numbers, arrived amongst them about the year 281 B.C. They had before them Thrace, Macedonia, Thessaly,
Greece, rich, but distracted and weakened by civil strife. They effected an entrance at several points,
devastating, plundering, loading their cars with booty, and dividing their prisoners into two parts; one offered
in sacrifice to their gods, the other strung up to trees and abandoned to the gais and matars, or javelins and
pikes of the conquerors.
Like all barbarians, they, both for pleasure and on principle, added insolence to ferocity. Their Brenn, or most
famous chieftain, whom the Latins and Greeks call Brennus, dragged in his train Macedonian prisoners, short,
mean, and with shaven heads, and exhibiting them beside Gallic warriors, tall, robust, long-haired, adorned
with chains of gold, said, "This is what we are, that is what our enemies are."
Ptolemy the Thunderbolt, King of Macedonia, received with haughtiness their first message requiring of him a
ransom for his dominions if he wished to preserve peace. "Tell those who sent you," he replied to the Gallic
deputation, "to lay down their arms and give up to me their chieftains. I will then see what peace I can grant
them." On the return of the deputation, the Gauls were moved to laughter. "He shall soon see," said they,
"whether it was in his interest or our own that we offered him peace." And, indeed, in the first engagement,
neither the famous Macedonian phalanx, nor the elephant he rode, could save King Ptolemy; the phalanx was
broken, the elephant riddled with javelins, the king himself taken, killed, and his head marched about the field
of battle on the top of a pike.
Macedonia was in consternation; there was a general flight from the open country, and the gates of the towns
were closed. "The people," says an historian, "cursed the folly of King Ptolemy, and invoked the names of
Philip and Alexander, the guardian deities of their land."
Three years later, another and a more formidable invasion came bursting upon Thessaly and Greece. It was,
according to the unquestionably exaggerated account of the ancient historians, two hundred thousand strong,
and commanded by that famous, ferocious, and insolent Brennus mentioned before. His idea was to strike a
blow which should simultaneously enrich the Gauls and stun the Greeks. He meant to plunder the temple at
Delphi, the most venerated place in all Greece, whither flowed from century to century all kinds of offerings,
and where, no doubt, enormous treasure was deposited. Such was, in the opinion of the day, the sanctity of the
place, that, on the rumor of the projected profanation, several Greeks essayed to divert the Gallic Brenn
himself, by appealing to his superstitious fears; but his answer was, "The gods have no need of wealth; it is
they who distribute it to men."
All Greece was moved. The nations of the Peloponnese closed the isthmus of Corinth by a wall. Outside the
isthmus, the Beeotians, Phocidians, Locrians, Megarians, and AEtolians formed a coalition under the
leadership of the Athenians; and, as their ancestors had done scarcely two hundred years before against
Xerxes and the Persians, they advanced in all haste to the pass of Thermopylae, to stop there the new
barbarians.
And for several days they did stop them; and instead of three hundred heroes, as of yore in the case of
Leonidas and his Spartans, only forty Greeks, they say, fell in the first engagement. 'Amongst them was a
young Athenian, Cydias by name, whose shield was hung in the temple of Zeus the savior, at Athens, with
this inscription:—
THE GAULS.
But soon, just as in the case of the Persians, traitors guided Brennus and his Gauls across the mountain-paths;
the position of Thermopylae was turned; the Greek army owed its safety to the Athenian galleys; and by
evening of the same day the barbarians appeared in sight of Delphi.
Brennus would have led them at once to the assault. He showed them, to excite them, the statues, vases, cars,
monuments of every kind, laden with gold, which adorned the approaches of the town and of the temple: "'Tis
pure gold—massive gold," was the news he had spread in every direction. But the very cupidity he
provoked was against his plan; for the Gauls fell out to plunder. He had to put off the assault until the morrow.
The night was passed in irregularities and orgies.
The Greeks, on the contrary, prepared with ardor for the fight. Their enthusiasm was intense. Those
barbarians, with their half-nakedness, their grossness, their ferocity, their ignorance, and their impiety, were
revolting. They committed murder and devastation like dolts. They left their dead on the field, without burial.
They engaged in battle without consulting priest or augur. It was not only their goods, but their families, their
life, the honor of their country, and the sanctuary of their religion, that the Greeks were defending, and they
might rely on the protection of the gods. The oracle of Apollo had answered, "I and the white virgins will
provide for this matter." The people surrounded the temple, and the priests supported and encouraged the
people. During the night small bodies of AEtolians, Amphisseans, and Phocidians arrived one after another.
Four thousand men had joined within Delphi, when the Gallic bands, in the morning, began to mount the
narrow and rough incline which led up to the town. The Greeks rained down from above a deluge of stones
and other missiles. The Gauls recoiled, but recovered themselves. The besieged fell back on the nearest streets
of the town, leaving open the approach to the temple, upon which the barbarians threw themselves. The
pillage of the shrines had just commenced when the sky looked threatening; a storm burst forth, the thunder
At last both princes and people grew weary. Antiochus, King of Syria, attacked one of the three
bands,—that of the Tectosagians,—conquered it, and cantoned it in a district of Upper Phrygia.
Later still, about 241 B.C., Eumenes, sovereign of Pergamos, and Attalus, his successor, drove and shut up the
other two bands, the Tolistoboians and Troemians, likewise in the same region. The victories of Attalus over
the Gauls excited veritable enthusiasm. He was celebrated as a special envoy from Zeus. He took the title of
King, which his predecessors had not hitherto borne. He had his battles showily painted; and that he might
triumph at the same time both in Europe and Asia, he sent one of the pictures to Athens, where it was still to
be seen three centuries afterwards, hanging upon the wall of the citadel. Forced to remain stationary, the
Gallic hordes became a people,—the Galatians,—and the country they occupied was called
Galatia. They lived there some fifty years, aloof from the indigenous population of Greeks and Phrygians,
whom they kept in an almost servile condition, preserving their warlike and barbarous habits, resuming
sometimes their mercenary service, and becoming once more the bulwark or the terror of neighboring states.
But at the beginning of the second century before our era, the Romans had entered Asia, in pursuit of their
great enemy, Hannibal. They had just beaten, near Magnesia, Antiochus, King of Syria. In his army they had
encountered men of lofty stature, with hair light or dyed red, half naked, marching to the fight with loud cries,
and terrible at the first onset. They recognized the Gauls, and resolved to destroy or subdue them. The consul,
Cn. Manlius, had the duty and the honor. Attacked in their strongholds on Mount Olympus and Mount
Magaba, 189 B.C., the three Gallic bands, after a short but stout resistance, were conquered and subjugated;
and thenceforth losing all national importance, they amalgamated little by little with the Asiatic populations
around them. From time to time they are still seen to reappear with their primitive manners and passions.
Nevertheless the amalgamation of the Gauls of Galatia with the natives always remained very imperfect; for
towards the end of the fourth century of the Christian era they did not speak Greek, as the latter did, but their
national tongue, that of the Kymro-Belgians; and St. Jerome testifies that it differed very little from that which
was spoken in Belgica itself, in the region of Troves.
The Romans had good ground for keeping a watchful eye, from the time they met them, upon the Gauls, and
for dreading them particularly. At the time when they determined to pursue them into the mountains of Asia
Minor, they were just at the close of a desperate struggle, maintained against them for four hundred years, in
Italy itself; "a struggle," says Sallust, "in which it was a question not of glory, but of existence, for Rome." It
was but just now remarked that at the beginning of the sixth century before our era, whilst, under their
chieftain Sigovesus, the Gallic bands whose history has occupied the last few pages were crossing the Rhine
and entering Germany, other bands, under the command of Bellovesus, were traversing the Alps and
swarming into Italy. From 587 to 521 B.C. five Gallic expeditions, formed of Gallic, Kymric, and Ligurian
tribes, followed the same route and invaded successively the two banks of the Po—the bottomless river,
as they called it. The Etruscans, who had long before, it will be remembered, themselves wrested that country
from a people of Gallic origin, the Umbrians or Ambrons, could not make head against the new conquerors,
aided, may be, by the remains of the old population. The well-built towns, the cultivation of the country, the
ports and canals that had been dug, nearly all these labors of Etruscan civilization disappeared beneath the
footsteps of these barbarous hordes that knew only how to destroy, and one of which gave its chieftain the
name of Hurricane (Elitorius, Ele-Dov). Scarcely five Etruscan towns, Mantua and Ravenna amongst others,
escaped disaster. The Gauls also founded towns, such as Mediolanum (Milan), Brixia (Brescia), Verona,
Bononia (Bologna), Sena-Gallica (Sinigaglia), &c. But for a long while they were no more than intrenched
camps, fortified places, where the population shut themselves up in case of necessity. "They, as a general rule,
straggled about the country," says Polybius, the most correct and clear-sighted of the ancient historians,
"sleeping on grass or straw, living on nothing but meat, busying themselves about nothing but war and a little
husbandry, and counting as riches nothing but flocks and gold, the only goods that can be carried away at
pleasure and on every occasion."
During nearly thirty years the Gauls thus scoured not only Upper Italy, which they had almost to themselves,
but all the eastern coast, and up to the head of the peninsula, encountering along the Adriatic, and in the rich
and effeminate cities of Magna Graecia, Sybaris, Tarentum, Crotona, and Locri, no enemy capable of resisting
them. But in the year 391 B.C., finding themselves cooped up in their territory, a strong band of Gauls crossed
the Apennines, and went to demand from the Etruscans of Clusium the cession of a portion of their lands. The
only answer Clusium made was to close her gates. The Gauls formed up around the walls. Clusium asked help
from Rome, with whom, notwithstanding the rivalry between the Etruscan and Roman nations, she had lately
been on good terms. The Romans promised first their good offices with the Gauls, afterwards material
support; and thus were brought face to face those two peoples, fated to continue for four centuries a struggle
which was to be ended only by the complete subjection of Gaul.
The details of that struggle belong specially to Roman history; they have been transmitted to us only by
Roman historians; and the Romans it was who were left ultimately in possession of the battle-field, that is, of
Italy. It will suffice here to make known the general march of events and the most characteristic incidents.
Four distinct periods may be recognized in this history; and each marks a different phase in the course of
events, and, so to speak, an act of the drama. During the first period, which lasted forty-two years, from 391 to
349 B.C., the Gauls carried on a war of aggression and conquest against Rome. Not that such had been their
But when they saw their pretensions repudiated and themselves treated with outrageous disdain, the Gauls left
the siege of Clusium on the spot, and set out for Rome, not stopping for plunder, and proclaiming everywhere
on their march, "We are bound for Rome; we make war on none but Romans;" and when they encountered the
Roman army, on the 16th of duly, 390 B.C., at the confluence of the Allia and the Tiber, half a day's march
from Rome, they abruptly struck up their war-chant, and threw themselves upon their enemies. It is well
known how they gained the day; how they entered Rome, and found none but a few gray-beards, who, being
unable or unwilling to leave their abode, had remained seated in the vestibule on their chairs of ivory, with
truncheons of ivory in their hands, and decorated with the insignia of the public offices they had filled. All the
people of Rome had fled, and were wandering over the country, or seeking a refuge amongst neighboring
peoples. Only the senate and a thousand warriors had shut themselves up in the Capitol, a citadel which
commanded the city. The Gauls kept them besieged there for seven months. The circumstances of this
celebrated siege are well known, though they have been a little embellished by the Roman historians. Not that
they have spoken too highly of the Romans themselves, who, in the day of their country's disaster, showed
admirable courage, perseverance, and hopefulness. Pontius Cominius, who traversed the Gallic camp, swam
the Tiber, and scaled by night the heights of the Capitol, to go and carry news to the senate; M. Manlius, who
was the first, and for some moments the only one, to hold in check, from the citadel's walls, the Gauls on the
point of effecting an entrance; and M. Furius Camillus, who had been banished from Rome the preceding
year, and had taken refuge in the town of Ardea, and who instantly took the field for his country, rallied the
Roman fugitives, and incessantly harassed the Gauls—are true heroes, who have earned their weed of
glory. Let no man seek to lower them in public esteem. Noble actions are so beautiful, and the actors often
receive so little recompense, that we are at least bound to hold sacred the honor attached to their name.
"Janus, Jupiter, our father Mars, Quirinus, Bellona, Lares, . . . ye gods in whose power are we, we and our
enemies, gods Manes, ye I adore; ye I pray, ye I adjure to give strength and victory to the Roman people, the
children of Quirinus, and to send confusion, panic, and death amongst the enemies of the Roman people, the
Then remounting, Decius charged into the middle of the Gauls, where he soon fell pierced with wounds; but
the Romans recovered courage and gained the day; for heroism and piety have power over the hearts of men,
so that at the moment of admiration they become capable of imitation.
During this second period Rome was more than once in danger. In the year 283 B.C. the Gauls destroyed one
of her armies near Aretium (Arezzo), and advanced to the Roman frontier, saying, "We are bound for Rome;
the Gauls know how to take it." Seventy-two years afterwards the Cisalpine Gauls swore they would not put
off their baldricks till they had mounted the Capitol, and they arrived within three days' march of Rome. At
every appearance of this formidable enemy the alarm at Rome was great. The senate raised all its forces and
summoned its allies. The people demanded a consultation of the Sibylline books, sacred volumes sold, it was
said, to Tarquinius Priscus by the sibyl Amalthea, and containing the secret of the destinies of the Republic.
They were actually opened in the year 228 B.C., and it was with terror found that the Gauls would twice take
possession of the soil of Rome. On the advice of the priests, there was dug within the city, in the middle of the
cattle-market, a huge pit, in which two Gauls, a man and a woman, were entombed alive; for thus they took
possession of the soil of Rome, the oracle was fulfilled, and the mishap averted. Thirteen years afterwards, on
occasion of the disaster at Cann, the same atrocity was again committed, at the same place and for the same
cause. And by a strange contrast, there was at the committing of this barbarous act, "which was against
Roman usage," says Livy, a secret feeling of horror, for, to appease the manes of the victims, a sacrifice was
instituted, which was celebrated every year at the pit, in the month of November.
In spite of sometimes urgent peril, in spite of popular alarms, Rome, during the course of this period, from
299 to 258 B.C., maintained an increasing ascendency over the Gauls. She always cleared them off her
territory, several times ravaged theirs, on the two banks of the Po,— called respectively Transpadan
and Cispadan Gaul, and gained the majority of the great battles she had to fight. Finally in the year 283 B.C.,
the proprietor Drusus, after having ravaged the country of the Senonic Gauls, carried off the very ingots and
jewels, it was said, which had been given to their ancestors as the price of their retreat. Solemn proclamation
was made that the ransom of the Capitol had returned within its walls; and, sixty years afterwards, the Consul
M. Cl. Marcellus, having defeated at Clastidium a numerous army of Gauls, and with his own hand slain their
general, Virdumar, had the honor of dedicating to the temple of Jupiter the third "grand spoils" taken since the
foundation of Rome, and of ascending the Capitol, himself conveying the armor of Virdumar, for he had got
hewn an oaken trunk, round which he had arranged the helmet, tunic, and breastplate of the barbarian king.
Nor was war Rome's only weapon against her enemies. Besides the ability of her generals and the discipline
of her legions, she had the sagacity of her Senate. The Gauls were not wanting in intelligence or dexterity, but
being too free to go quietly under a master's hand, and too barbarous for self-government, carried away, as
they were, by the interest or passion of the moment, they could not long act either in concert or with sameness
of purpose. Far-sightedness and the spirit of persistence were, on the contrary, the familiar virtues of the
Roman Senate. So soon as they had penetrated Cisalpine Gaul, they labored to gain there a permanent footing,
either by sowing dissension amongst the Gallic peoplets that lived there, or by founding Roman colonies. In
the year 283 B.C., several Roman families arrived, with colors flying and under the guidance of three
triumvirs or commissioners, on a territory to the north-east, on the borders of the Adriatic. The triumvirs had a
round hole dug, and there deposited some fruits and a handful of earth brought from Roman soil; then yoking
to a plough, having a copper share, a white bull and a white heifer, they marked out by a furrow a large
enclosure. The rest followed, flinging within the line the ridges thrown up by the plough. When the line was
finished, the bull and the heifer were sacrificed with due pomp. It was a Roman colony come to settle at Sena,
on the very site of the chief town of those Senonic Gauls who had been conquered and driven out. Fifteen
years afterwards another Roman colony was founded at Ariminum (Rimini), on the frontier of the Bolan
Towards the close of the third century before our era, the triumph of Rome in Cisalpine Gaul seemed nigh to
accomplishment, when news arrived that the Romans' most formidable enemy, Hannibal, meditating a
passage from Africa into Italy by Spain and Gaul, was already at work, by his emissaries, to insure for his
enterprise the concurrence of the Transalpine and Cisalpine Gauls. The Senate ordered the envoys they had
just then at Carthage to traverse Gaul on returning, and seek out allies there against Hannibal. The envoys
halted amongst the Gallo-Iberian peoplets who lived at the foot of the eastern Pyrenees. There, in the midst of
the warriors assembled in arms, they charged them in the name of the great and powerful Roman people, not
to suffer the Carthaginians to pass through their territory. Tumultuous laughter arose at a request that appeared
so strange. "You wish us," was the answer, "to draw down war upon ourselves to avert it from Italy, and to
give our own fields over to devastation to save yours. We have no cause to complain of the Carthaginians or
to be pleased with the Romans, or to take up arms for the Romans and against the Carthaginians. We, on the
contrary, hear that the Roman people drive out from their lands, in Italy, men of our nation, impose tribute
upon them, and make them undergo other indignities." So the envoys of Rome quitted Gaul without allies.
Hannibal, on the other hand, did not meet with all the favor and all the enthusiasm he had anticipated.
Between the Pyrenees and the Alps several peoplets united with him; and several showed coldness, or even
hostility. In his passage of the Alps the mountain tribes harassed him incessantly. Indeed, in Cisalpine Gaul
itself there was great division and hesitation; for Rome had succeeded in inspiring her partisans with
confidence and her enemies with fear. Hannibal was often obliged to resort to force even against the Gauls
whose alliance he courted, and to ravage their lands in order to drive them to take up arms. Nay, at the
conclusion of an alliance, and in the very camp of the Carthaginians, the Gauls sometimes hesitated still, and
sometimes rose against Hannibal, accused him of ravaging their country, and refused to obey his orders.
However, the delights of victory and of pillage at last brought into full play the Cisalpine Gauls' natural hatred
of Rome. After Ticinus and Trebia, Hannibal had no more zealous and devoted troops. At the battle of Lake
Trasimene he lost fifteen hundred men, nearly all Gauls; at that of Canine he had thirty thousand of them,
forming two thirds of his army; and at the moment of action they cast away their tunics and checkered cloaks
(similar to the plaids of the Gals or Scottish Highlanders), and fought naked from the belt upwards, according
to their custom when they meant to conquer or die. Of five thousand five hundred men that the victory of
Cannae cost Hannibal, four thousand were Gauls. All Cisalpine Gaul was moved; enthusiasm was at its
height; new bands hurried off to recruit the army of the Carthaginian who, by dint of patience and genius,
brought Rome within an ace of destruction, with the assistance almost entirely of the barbarians he had come
to seek at her gates, and whom he had at first found so cowed and so vacillating.
When the day of reverses came, and Rome had recovered her ascendency, the Gauls were faithful to
Hannibal; and when at length he was forced to return to Africa, the Gallic bands, whether from despair or
attachment, followed him thither. In the year 200 B.C., at the famous battle of Zama, which decided matters
between Rome and Carthage, they again formed a third of the Carthaginian army, and showed that they were,
in the words of Livy, "inflamed by that innate hatred towards the Romans which is peculiar to their race."
This was the third period of the struggle between the Gauls and the Romans in Italy. Rome, well advised by
this terrible war of the danger with which she was ever menaced by the Cisalpine Gauls, formed the resolution
of no longer restraining them, but of subduing them and conquering their territory. She spent thirty years
(from 200 to 170 B.C.) in the execution of this design, proceeding by means of war, of founding Roman
colonies, and of sowing dissension amongst the Gallic peoplets. In vain did the two principal, the Boians and
the Insubrians, endeavor to rouse and rally all the rest: some hesitated; some absolutely refused, and remained
neutral. The resistance was obstinate. The Gauls, driven from their fields and their towns, established
The Senate, with its usual wisdom, multiplied the number of Roman colonies in the conquered territory,
treated with moderation the tribes that submitted, and gave to Cisalpine Gaul the name of the Cisalpine or
Hither Gallic Province, which was afterwards changed for that of Gallia Togata or Roman Gaul. Then,
declaring that nature herself had placed the Alps between Gaul and Italy as an insurmountable barrier, the
Senate pronounced "a curse on whosoever should attempt to cross it."
CHAPTER III.
The Gauls of the Alps demanded succor of the Transalpine Gauls, applying to a powerful chieftain, named
Cincibil, whose influence extended throughout the mountains. But the terror of the Roman name had reached
across. Cincibil sent to Rome a deputation, with his brother at their head, to set forth the grievances of the
mountaineers, and especially to complain of the consul Cassius, who had carried off and sold several
thousands of Gauls. Without making any concession, the Senate was gracious. Cassius was away; he must be
waited for. Meanwhile the Gauls were well treated; Cincibil and his brother received as presents two golden
collars, five silver vases, two horses fully caparisoned, and Roman dresses for all their suite. Still nothing was
done.
Another, a greater and more decisive opportunity offered itself. Marseilles was an ally of the Romans. As the
rival of Carthage, and with the Gauls forever at her gates, she had need of Rome by sea and land. She
pretended, also, to the most eminent and intimate friendship with Rome. Her founder, the Phocean Euxenes,
had gone to Rome, it was said, and concluded a treaty with Tarquinius Priscus. She had gone into mourning
Rome treated the Arvernians with consideration; but the Allobrogians lost their existence as a nation. The
Senate declared them subject to the Roman people; and all the country comprised between the Alps, the
Rhone from its entry into the Lake of Geneva to its mouth, and the Mediterranean, was made a Roman
consular province, which means that every year a consul must march thither with his army. In the three
following years, indeed, the consuls extended the boundaries of the new province, on the right bank of the
Rhone, to the frontier of the Pyrenees southward. In the year 115 B.C. a colony of Roman citizens was
conducted to Narbonne, a town even then of importance, in spite of the objections made by certain senators
who were unwilling, say the historians, so to expose Roman citizens "to the waves of barbarism." This was
the second colony which went and established itself out of Italy; the first had been founded on the ruins of
Carthage.
Having thus completed their conquest, the Senate, to render possession safe and sure, decreed the occupation
of the passes of the Alps which opened Gaul to Italy. There was up to that time no communication with Gaul
save along the Mediterranean, by a narrow and difficult path, which has become in our time the beautiful
route called the Corniche. The mountain tribes defended their independence with desperation; when that of the
Stumians, who occupied the pass of the maritime Alps, saw their inability to hold their own, they cut the
throats of their wives and children, set fire to their houses, and threw themselves into the flames. But the
Senate pursued its course imperturbably. All the chief defiles of the Alps fell into its hands. The old
Phoenician road, restored by the consul Domitius, bore thenceforth his name (Via Donaitia), and less than
sixty years after Cisalpine Gaul had been reduced to a Roman province, Rome possessed, in Transalpine Gaul,
a second province, whither she sent her armies, and where she established her citizens without obstruction.
But Providence seldom allows men, even in the midst of their successes, to forget for long how precarious
they are; and when He is pleased to remind them, it is not by words, as the Persians reminded their king, but
by fearful events that He gives His warnings. At the very moment when Rome believed herself set free from
Gallic invasions, and on the point of avenging herself by a course of conquest, a new invasion, more extensive
and more barbarous, came bursting upon Rome and upon Gaul at the same time, and plunged them together in
the same troubles and the same perils.
In the year 113 B.C. there appeared to the north of the Adriatic, on the right bank of the Danube, an immense
multitude of barbarians, ravaging Noricum and threatening Italy. Two nations predominated; the Kymrians or
Cimbrians, and the Teutons, the national name of the Germans. They came from afar, northward, from the
Cimbrian peninsula, nowadays Jutland, and from the countries bordering on the Baltic which nowadays form
the duchies of Holstein and Schleswig. A violent shock of earthquake, a terrible inundation, had driven them,
they said, from their homes; and those countries do indeed show traces of such events. And Cimbrians and
Teutons had been for some time roaming over Germany.
The consul Papirius Carbo, despatched in all haste to defend the frontier, bade them, in the name of the
Roman people, to withdraw. The barbarians modestly replied that they had no intention of settling in
Noricum, and if the Romans had rights over the country, they would carry their arms elsewhere. The consul,
who had found haughtiness succeed, thought he might also employ perfidy against the barbarians. He offered
guides to conduct them out of Noricum; and the guides misled them. The consul attacked them unexpectedly
during the night, and was beaten.
There the name of Rome again arrested their progress; they applied to her anew for lands, with the offer of
their services. "Rome," answered M. Silanus, who commanded in the province, "has neither lands to give you
nor services to accept from you." He attacked them in their camp, and was beaten.
Three consuls, L. Cassius, C. Servilius Omepio, and Cu. Manlius, successively experienced the same fate.
With the barbarians victory bred presumption. Their chieftains met and deliberated whether they should not
forthwith cross into Italy, to exterminate or enslave the Romans, and make Kymrian spoken at Rome. Scaurus,
a prisoner, was in the tent, loaded with fetters, during the deliberation. He was questioned about the resources
of his country. "Cross not the Alps," said he; "go not into Italy: the Romans are invincible." In a transport of
fury the chieftain of the Kymrians, Boiorix by name, fell upon the Roman, and ran him through. Howbeit the
advice of Scaurus was followed. The barbarians did not as yet dare to decide upon invading Italy; but they
freely scoured the Roman province, meeting here with repulse, and there with re-enforcement from the
peoplets who formed the inhabitants. The Tectosagian Voles, Hymrian in origin and maltreated by Rome,
joined them. Then, on a sudden, whilst the Teutons and Ambrons remained in Gaul, the Kymrians passed over
to Spain without apparent motive, and probably as an overswollen torrent divides, and disperses its waters in
all directions. The commotion at Rome was extreme; never had so many or such wild barbarians threatened
the Republic; never had so many or such large Roman armies been beaten in succession. There was but one
man, it was said, who could avert the danger, and give Rome the ascendency. It was Marius, low-born, but
already illustrious; esteemed by the Senate for his genius as a commander and for his victories; swaying at his
will the people, who saw in him one of themselves, and admired without envying him; beloved and feared by
the army for his bravery, his rigorous discipline, and his readiness to share their toils and dangers; stern and
rugged; without education, eloquence, or riches; ill-suited for shining in public assemblies, but resolute and
dexterous in action; verily made to dominate the vigorous but unrefined multitude, whether in camp or city,
partly by participating their feelings, partly by giving them in his own person a specimen of the deserts and
sometimes of the virtues which they esteem but do not possess.
He was consul in Africa, where he was putting an end to the war with Jugurtha. He was elected a second time
consul, without interval and in his absence, contrary to all the laws of the Republic. Scarcely had he returned,
when, on descending from the Capitol, where he had just received a triumph for having conquered and
captured Jugurtha, he set out for Gaul. On his arrival, instead of proceeding, as his predecessors, to attack the
barbarians at once, he confined himself to organizing and inuring his troops, subjecting them to frequent
marches, all kinds of military exercises, and long and hard labor. To insure supplies he made them dig,
towards the mouths of the Rhone, a large canal which formed a junction with the river a little above Arles, and
which, at its entrance into the sea, offered good harborage for vessels. This canal, which existed for a long
while under the name of Rossae Mariance (the dikes of Marius), is filled up nowadays; but at its southern
extremity the village of Foz still preserves a remembrance of it. Trained in this severe school, the soldiers
acquired such a reputation for sobriety and laborious assiduity, that they were proverbially called Marius's
mules.
He was as careful for their moral state as for their physical fitness, and labored to exalt their imaginations as
well as to harden their bodies. In that camp, and amidst those toils in which he kept them strictly engaged,
frequent sacrifices, and scrupulous care in consulting the oracles, kept superstition at a white heat. A Syrian
Two years rolled on in this fashion; and yet Marius would not move. The increasing devastation of the
country, fire, and famine, the despair and complaints of the inhabitants, did not shake his resolution. Nor was
the confidence he inspired both in the camp and at Rome a whit shaken: he was twice re-elected consul, once
while he was still absent, and once during a visit he paid to Rome to give directions to his party in person.
It was at Rome, in the year 102 B.C., that he learned how the Kymrians, weary of Spain, had recrossed the
Pyrenees, rejoined their old comrades, and had at last resolved, in concert, to invade Italy; the Kymrians from
the north, by way of Helvetia and Noricum, the Teutons and Ambrons from the south, by way of the maritime
Alps. They were to form a junction on the banks of the Po, and thence march together on Rome. At this news
Marius returned forthwith to Gaul, and, without troubling himself about the Kymrians, who had really put
themselves in motion towards the north-east, he placed his camp so as to cover at one and the same time the
two Roman roads which crossed at Arles, and by one of which the Ambro-Teutons must necessarily pass to
enter Italy on the south.
They soon appeared "in immense numbers," say the historians, "with their hideous looks and their wild cries,"
drawing up their chariots and planting their tents in front of the Roman camp. They showered upon Marius
and his soldiers continual insult and defiance. The Romans, in their irritation, would fain have rushed out of
their camp, but Marius restrained them. "It is no question," said he, with his simple and convincing common
sense, "of gaining triumphs and trophies; it is a question of averting this storm of war and of saving Italy." A
Teutonic chieftain came one day up to the very gates of the camp, and challenged him to fight. Marius had
him informed that if he were tired of life he could go and hang himself. As the barbarian still persisted, Marius
sent him a gladiator.
However, he made his soldiers, in regular succession, mount the ramparts, to get them familiarized with the
cries, looks, arms, and movements of the barbarians. The most distinguished of his officers, young Sertorius,
who understood and spoke Gallic well, penetrated, in the disguise of a Gaul, into the camp of the Ambrons,
and informed Marius of what was going on there.
At last the barbarians, in their impatience, having vainly attempted to storm the Roman camp, struck their
own, and put themselves in motion towards the Alps. For six whole days, it is said, their bands were defiling
beneath the ramparts of the Romans, and crying, "Have you any message for your wives? We shall soon be
with them."
Marius, too, struck his camp, and followed them. They halted, both of them, near Aix, on the borders of the
Coenus, the barbarians in the valley, Marius on a hill which commanded it. The ardor of the Romans was at
its height; it was warm weather; there was a want of water on the hill, and the soldiers murmured. "You are
men," said Marius, pointing to the river below, "and there is water to be bought with blood." "Why don't you
lead us against them at once, then," said a soldier, "whilst we still have blood in our veins?" "We must first
fortify our camp," answered Marius quietly.
The soldiers obeyed: but the hour of battle had come, and well did Marius know it. It commenced on the brink
of the Coenus, between some Ambrons who were bathing and some Roman slaves gone down to draw water.
When the whole horde of the Ambrons advanced to the battle, shouting their war-cry of Ambra! Ambra! a
body of Gallic auxiliaries in the Roman army, and in the first rank, heard them with great amazement; for it
was their own name and their own cry; there were tribes of Ambrons in the Alps subjected to Rome as well as
in the Helvetic Alps; and Ambra! Ambra! resounded on both sides.
As to the booty, the Roman army with one voice made a free gift of it to Marius; but he, remembering,
perhaps, what had been lately done by the barbarians after the defeat of the consuls Manlius and Czepio,
Were we travelling in Provence, in the neighborhood of Aix, we should encounter, peradventure, some
peasant who, whilst pointing out to us the summit of a lull whereon, in all probability, Marius offered,
nineteen hundred and forty years ago, that glorious sacrifice, would say to us in his native dialect, "Aqui es
lou deloubre do la Vittoria:" "There is the temple of victory." There, indeed, was built, not far from a pyramid
erected in honor of Marius, a little temple dedicated to Victory. Thither, every year, in the month of May, the
population used to come and celebrate a festival and light a bonfire, answered by other bonfires on the
neighboring heights. When Gaul became Christian, neither monument nor festival perished; a saint took the
place of the goddess, and the temple of Victory became the church of St. Victoire. There are still ruins of it to
this day; the religious procession which succeeded the pagan festival ceased only at the first outburst of the
Revolution; and the vague memory of a great national event still mingles in popular tradition with the legends
of the saint.
The Ambrons and Teutons beaten, there remained the Kymrians, who, according to agreement, had repassed
the Helvetic Alps and entered Italy on the north-east, by way of the Adige. Marius marched against them in
July of the following year, 101 B.C. Ignorant of what had occurred in Gaul, and possessed, as ever, with the
desire of a settlement, they again sent to him a deputation, saying, "Give us lands and towns for us and our
brethren." "What brethren?" asked Marius. "The Teutons." The Romans who were about Marius began to
laugh. "Let your brethren be," said Marius; "they have land, and will always have it; they received it from us."
The Kymrians, perceiving the irony of his tone, burst out into threats, telling Marius that he should suffer for
it at their hands first, and afterwards at those of the Teutons when they arrived. "They are here," rejoined
Marius; "you must not depart without saluting your brethren;" and he had Teutobod, King of the Teutons,
brought out with other captive chieftains. The envoys reported the sad news in their own camp, and three days
afterwards, July 30, a great battle took place between the Kymrians and the Romans in the Raudine Plains, a
large tract near Verceil.
It were unnecessary to dwell on the details of the battle, which resembled that of Aix; besides, fought as it was
in Italy and by none but Romans, it has but little to do with a history of Gaul. It has been mentioned only to
make known the issue of that famous invasion, of which Gaul was the principal theatre. For a moment it
threatened the very existence of the Roman Republic. The victories of Marius arrested the torrent, but did not
dry up its source. The great movement which drove from Asia to Europe, and from eastern to western Europe,
masses of roving populations, followed its course, bringing incessantly upon the Roman frontiers new comers
and new perils. A greater man than Marius, Julius Caesar in fact, saw that to effectually resist these clouds of
barbaric assailants, the country into which they poured must be conquered and made Roman. The conquest of
Gaul was the accomplishment of that idea, and the decisive step towards the transformation of the Roman
republic into a Roman empire.
CHAPTER IV.
In spite of the victories of Marius, and the destruction or dispersion of the Teutons and Cimbrians, the whole
of Gaul remained seriously disturbed and threatened. At the north-east, in Belgica, some bands of other
Teutons, who had begun to be called Germans (men of war), had passed over the left bank of the Rhine, and
were settling or wandering there without definite purpose. In eastern and central Gaul, in the valleys of the
Jura and Auvergne, on the banks of the Saone, the Allier, and the Doubs, the two great Gallic confederations,
that of the AEduans and that of the Arvernians, were disputing the preponderance, and making war one upon
A people of Gallic race, the Helvetians, who inhabited present Switzerland, where the old name still abides
beside the modern, found themselves incessantly threatened, ravaged, and invaded by the German tribes
which pressed upon their frontiers. After some years of perplexity and internal discord, the whole Helvetic
nation decided upon abandoning its territory, and going to seek in Gaul, westward, it is said, on the borders of
the ocean, a more tranquil settlement. Being informed of this design, the Roman Senate and Caesar, at that
time consul, resolved to protect the Roman province and their Gallic allies, the AEduans, against this
inundation of roving neighbors. The Helvetians none the less persisted in their plan; and in the spring of the
year of Rome 696 (58 B C.) they committed to the flames, in the country they were about to leave, twelve
towns, four hundred villages, and all their houses; loaded their cars with provisions for three months, and
agreed to meet at the southern point of the Lake of Geneva. They found on their reunion, says Caesar, a total
of three hundred and sixty-eight thousand emigrants, including ninety-two thousand men-at-arms. The
Switzerland which they abandoned numbers now two million five hundred thousand inhabitants. But when the
Helvetians would have entered Gaul, they found there Caesar, who, after having got himself appointed
proconsul for five years, had arrived suddenly at Geneva, prepared to forbid their passage. They sent to him a
deputation, to ask leave, they said, merely to traverse the Roman province without causing the least damage.
Caesar knew as well how to gain time as not to lose any: he was not ready; so he put off the Helvetians to a
second conference. In the interval he employed his legionaries, who could work as well as fight, in erecting
upon the left bank of the Rhone a wall sixteen feet high and ten miles long, which rendered the passage of the
river very difficult, and, on the return of the Helvetian envoys, he formally forbade them to pass by the road
they had proposed to follow. They attempted to take another, and to cross not the Rhone but the Saone, and
march thence towards western Gaul. But whilst they were arranging for the execution of this movement,
AEduans, Sequanians, or Arvernians, all the Gauls interested in the struggle thus terminated, were eager to
congratulate Caesar upon his victory; but if they were delivered from the invasion of the Helvetians, another
scourge fell heavily upon them; Ariovistus and the Germans, who were settled upon their territory, oppressed
The cheers of the troops, officers and men, were the answer given to the reproaches and hopes of their
general: all hesitation passed away; and Caesar set out with his army. He fetched a considerable compass, to
spare them the passage of thick forests, and, after a seven days' march, arrived at a short distance from the
camp of Ariovistus. On learning that Caesar was already so near, the German sent to him a messenger with
proposals for the interview which was but lately demanded, and to which there was no longer any obstacle,
since Caesar had himself arrived upon the spot. And the interview really took place, with mutual precautions
for safety and warlike dignity. Caesar repeated all the demands he had made upon Ariovistus, who, in his turn,
maintained his refusal, asking, "What was wanted? Why had foot been set upon his lands? That part of Gaul
was his province, just as the other was the Roman province. If Caesar did not retire, and withdraw his troops,
he should consider him no more a friend, but an enemy. He knew that if he were to slay Caesar, he would
recommend himself to many nobles and chiefs amongst the Roman people; he had learned as much from their
own envoys. But if Caesar retired and left him, Ariovistus, in free possession of Gaul, he would pay liberally
in return, and would wage on Caesar's behalf, without trouble or danger to him, any wars he might desire."
During this interview it is probable that Caesar smiled more than once at the boldness and shrewdness of the
barbarian. Ultimately some horsemen in the escort of Ariovistus began to caracole towards the Romans, and
It is uncertain whether he had from the very first determined the whole plan; but so soon as he set seriously to
work, he felt all the difficulties. The expulsion of the Helvetian emigrants and of the German invaders left the
Romans and Gauls alone face to face; and from that moment the Romans were, in the eyes of the Gauls,
foreigners, conquerors, oppressors. Their deeds aggravated day by day the feelings excited by the situation;
they did not ravage the country, as the Germans had done; they did not appropriate such and such a piece of
land; but everywhere they assumed the mastery: they laid heavy burdens upon the population; they removed
the rightful chieftains who were opposed to them, and forcibly placed or maintained in power those only who
were subservient to them. Independently of the Roman empire, Caesar established everywhere his own
personal influence; by turns gentle or severe, caressing or threatening, he sought and created for himself
partisans amongst the Gauls, as he had amongst his army, showing favor to those only whose devotion was
assured to him. To national antipathy towards foreigners must be added the intrigues and personal rivalry of
the conquered in their relations with the conqueror. Conspiracies were hatched, insurrections soon broke out
in nearly every part of Gaul, in the heart even of the peoplets most subject to Roman dominion. Every
movement of the kind was for Caesar a provocation, a temptation, almost an obligation to conquest. He
accepted them and profited by them, with that promptitude in resolution, boldness and address in execution,
and cool indifference as to the means employed, which were characteristic of his genius. During nine years,
from A. U. C. 696 to 705, and in eight successive campaigns, he carried his troops, his lieutenants, himself,
and, ere long, war or negotiation, corruption, discord, or destruction in his path, amongst the different nations
and confederations of Gaul, Celtic, Kymric, Germanic, Iberian or Hybrid, northward and eastward, in Belgica,
between the Seine and the Rhine; westward, in Armorica, on the borders of the ocean; south-westward, in
Aquitania; centre-ward, amongst the peoplets established between the Seine, the Loire, and the Saone. He was
nearly always victorious, and then at one time he pushed his victory to the bitter end, at another stopped at the
right moment, that it might not be compromised. When he experienced reverses, he bore them without
repining, and repaired them with inexhaustible ability and courage. More than once, to revive the sinking
spirits of his men, he was rashly lavish of his person; and on one of those occasions, at the raising of the siege
of Gergovia, he was all but taken by some Arvernian horsemen, and left his sword in their hands. It was found
a while afterwards, when the war was over, in a temple in which the Gauls had hung it. Caesar's soldiers
would have torn it down and returned it to him; but "let it be," said he; "'tis sanctified." In good or evil
fortune, the hero of a triumph at Rome or a prisoner in the hands of Mediterranean pirates, he was unrivalled
in striking the imaginations of men and growing great in their eyes. He did not confine himself to conquering
and subjecting the Gauls in Gaul; his ideas were ever outstripping his deeds, and he knew how to make his
power felt even where he had made no attempt to establish it. Twice he crossed the Rhine to hurl back the
Germans beyond their river, and to strike to the very hearts of their forests the terror of the Roman name (A.
U. C. 699, 700). He equipped two fleets, made two descents on Great Britain (A. U. C. 699, 700), several
times defeated the Britons and their principal chieftain Caswallon (Cassivellaunus), and set up across the
channel, the first landmarks of Roman conquest. He thus became more and more famous and terrible, both in
But the greatest minds are far from foreseeing all the consequences of their deeds, and all the perils
proceeding from their successes. Caesar was by nature neither violent nor cruel; but he did not trouble himself
about justice or humanity, and the success of his enterprises, no matter by what means or at what price, was
his sole law of conduct. He could show, on occasion, moderation and mercy; but when he had to put down an
obstinate resistance, or when a long and arduous effort had irritated him, he had no hesitation in employing
atrocious severity and perfidious promises. During his first campaign in Belgica, (A. U. C. 697 and 57 B.C.),
two peoplets, the Nervians and the Aduaticans, had gallantly struggled, with brief moments of success, against
the Roman legions. The Nervians were conquered and almost annihilated. Their last remnants, huddled for
refuge in the midst of their morasses, sent a deputation to Caesar, to make submission, saying, "Of six
hundred senators three only are left, and of sixty thousand men that bore arms scarce five hundred have
escaped." Caesar received them kindly, returned to them their lands, and warned their neighbors to do them no
harm. The Aduaticans, on the contrary, defended them selves to the last extremity. Caesar, having slain four
thousand, had all that remained sold by auction; and fifty-six thousand human beings, according to his own
statement, passed as slaves into the hands of their purchasers. Some years later another Belgian peoplet, the
Eburons, settled between the Meuse and the Rhine, rose and inflicted great losses upon the Roman legions.
Caesar put them beyond the pale of military and human law, and had all the neighboring peoplets and all the
roving bands invited to come and pillage and destroy "that accursed race," promising to whoever would join
in the work the friendship of the Roman people. A little later still, some insurgents in the centre of Gaul had
concentrated in a place to the south-west, called Urellocdunum (nowadays, it is said, Puy d'Issola, in the
department of the Lot, between Vayrac and Martel). After a long resistance they were obliged to surrender,
and Caesar had all the combatants' hands cut off, and sent them, thus mutilated, to live and rove throughout
Gaul, as a spectacle to all the country that was, or was to be, brought to submission. Nor were the rigors of
administration less than those of warfare. Caesar wanted a great deal of money, not only to maintain
satisfactorily his troops in Gaul, but to defray the enormous expenses he was at in Italy, for the purpose of
enriching his partisans, or securing the favor of the Roman people. It was with the produce of imposts and
plunder in Gaul that he undertook the reconstruction at Rome of the basilica of the Forum, the site whereof,
extending to the temple of Liberty, was valued, it is said, at more than twenty million five hundred thousand
francs. Cicero, who took the direction of the works, wrote to his friend Atticus, "We shall make it the most
glorious thing in the world." Cato was less satisfied; three years previously despatches from Caesar had
announced to the Senate his victories over the Belgian and German insurgents. The senators had voted a
general thanksgiving, but, "Thanksgiving!" cried Cato, "rather expiation! Pray the gods not to visit upon our
armies the sin of a guilty general. Give up Caesar to the Germans, and let the foreigner know that Rome does
not enjoin perjury, and rejects with horror the fruit thereof!"
Caesar had all the gifts, all the means of success and empire, that can be possessed by man. He was great in
politics and in war; as active and as full of resource amidst the intrigues of the Forum as amidst the
combinations and surprises of the battle-field, equally able to please and to terrify. He had a double pride,
which gave him double confidence in himself, the pride of a great noble and the pride of a great man. He was
fond of saying, "My aunt Julia is, maternally, the daughter of kings; paternally, she is descended from the
immortal gods; my family unites, to the sacred character of kings who are the most powerful amongst men,
the awful majesty of the gods who have even kings in their keeping." Thus, by birth as well as nature, Caesar
felt called to dominion; and at the same time he was perfectly aware of the decadence of the Roman patriciate,
and of the necessity for being popular in order to become master. With this double instinct he undertook the
conquest of the Gauls as the surest means of achieving conquest at Rome. But owing either to his own vices
or to the difficulties of the situation, he displayed in his conduct and his work in Gaul so much violence and
oppression, so much iniquity and cruel indifference, that, even at that time, in the midst of Roman harshness,
pagan corruption, and Gallic or German barbarism, so great an infliction of moral and material harm could not
but be followed by a formidable reaction. Where there are strength and ability, the want of foresight, the fears,
The same perils and the same reverses, the same sufferings and the same resentments, had stirred up amongst
the Gauls, without distinction of race and name, a sentiment to which they had hitherto been almost strangers,
the sentiment of Gallic nationality and the passion for independence, not local any longer, but national. This
sentiment was first manifested amongst the populace and under obscure chieftains; a band of Carnutian
peasants (people of Chartrain) rushed upon the town of Genabum (Gies), roused the inhabitants, and
massacred the Italian traders and a Roman knight, C. Fusius Cita, whom Caesar had commissioned to buy
corn there. In less than twenty-four hours the signal of insurrection against Rome was borne across the
country as far as the Arvernians, amongst whom conspiracy had long ago been waiting and paving the way for
insurrection. Amongst them lived a young Gaul whose real name has remained unknown, and whom history
has called Vercingetorix, that is, chief over a hundred heads, chief-in-general. He came of an ancient and
powerful family of Arvernians, and his father had been put to death in his own city for attempting to make
himself king. Caesar knew him, and had taken some pains to attach him to himself. It does not appear that the
Arvernian aristocrat had absolutely declined the overtures; but when the hope of national independence was
aroused, Vercingetorix was its representative and chief. He descended with his followers from the mountain,
and seized Gergovia, the capital of his nation. Thence his messengers spread over the centre, north-west, and
west of Gaul; the greater part of the peoplets and cities of those regions pronounced from the first moment for
insurrection; the same sentiment was working amongst others more compromised with Rome, who waited
only for a breath of success to break out. Vercingetorix was immediately invested with the chief command,
and he made use of it with all the passion engendered by patriotism and the possession of power; he regulated
the movement, demanded hostages, fixed the contingents of troops, imposed taxes, inflicted summary
punishment on the traitors, the dastards, and the indifferent, and subjected those who turned a deaf ear to the
appeal of their common country to the same pains and the same mutilations that Caesar inflicted on those who
obstinately resisted the Roman yoke.
At the news of this great movement Caesar immediately left Italy, and returned to Gaul. He had one quality,
rare even amongst the greatest men: he remained cool amidst the very hottest alarms; necessity never hurried
him into precipitation, and he prepared for the struggle as if he were always sure of arriving on the spot in
time to sustain it. He was always quick, but never hasty; and his activity and patience were equally admirable
and efficacious. Starting from Italy at the beginning of 702 A. U. C., he passed two months in traversing
within Gaul the Roman province and its neighborhood, in visiting the points threatened by the insurrection,
and the openings by which he might get at it, in assembling his troops, in confirming his wavering allies; and
it was not before the early part of March that he moved with his whole army to Agendicum (Sens), the very
centre of revolt, and started thence to push on the war with vigor. In less than three months he had spread
devastation throughout the insurgent country; he had attacked and taken its principal cities, Vellaunodunum
(Trigueres), Genabum (Gien), Noviodunum (Sancerre), and Avaricum (Bourges), delivering up everywhere
country and city, lands and inhabitants, to the rage of the Roman soldiery, maddened at having again to
conquer enemies so often conquered. To strike a decisive blow, he penetrated at last to the heart of the country
of the Arvernians, and laid siege to Gergovia, their capital and the birthplace of Vercingetorix.
The firmness and the ability of the Gallic chieftain were not inferior to such a struggle. He understood from
the outset that he could not cope in the open field with Caesar and the Roman legions; he therefore exerted
himself in getting together a body of cavalry numerous enough to harass the Romans during their movements,
to attack their scattered detachments, to bear his orders swiftly to all quarters, and to keep up the excitement
amongst the different peoplets with some hope of success. His plan of campaign, his repeated instructions, his
Caesar at once took a resolution as unexpected as it was discreetly bold. Here was the whole Gallic
insurrection, chieftain and soldiery, united together within or beneath the walls of a town of moderate extent.
He undertook to keep it there and destroy it on the spot, instead of having to pursue it everywhere without
ever being sure of getting at it. He had at his disposal eleven legions, about fifty thousand strong, and five or
six thousand cavalry, of which two thousand were Germans. He placed them round about Alesia and the
Gallic camp, caused to be dug a circuit of deep ditches, some filled with water, others bristling with palisades
and snares, and added, from interval to interval, twenty-three little forts, occupied or guarded night and day by
detachments. The result was a line of investment about ten miles in extent. To the rear of the Roman camp,
and for defence against attacks from without, Caesar caused to be dug similar intrenchments, which formed a
line of circumvallation of about thirteen miles. The troops had provisions and forage for thirty days.
Vercingetorix made frequent sallies to stop or destroy these works; but they were repulsed, and only resulted
in getting his army more closely cooped up within the place. Eighty thousand Gallic insurgents were, as it
were, in prison, guarded by fifty thousand Roman soldiers. Vercingetorix was one of those who persevere and
act in the days of distress just as in the spring-tide of their hopes. Before the works of the Romans were
finished, he assembled his horsemen, and ordered them to sally briskly from Alesia, return each to his own
land, and summon the whole population to arms. He was obeyed; the Gallic horsemen made their way, during
the night, through the intervals left by the Romans' still imperfect lines of investment, and dispersed
themselves amongst their various peoplets. Nearly everywhere irritation and zeal were at their height. An
assemblage of delegates met at Bibracte (Autun), and fixed the amount of the contingent to be furnished by
each nation, and a point was assigned at which all those contingents should unite for the purpose of marching
together towards Alesia, and attacking the besiegers. The total of the contingents thus levied on forty-three
Gallic peoplets amounted, according to Caesar, to two hundred and eighty-three thousand men; and two
hundred and forty thousand men, it is said, did actually hurry up to the appointed place. Mistrust of such
enormous numbers has already been expressed by one who has lived through the greatest European wars, and
has heard the ablest generals reduce to their real strength the largest armies. We find in M. Thiers' History of
the Consulate and Empire, that at Austerlitz, on the 2d of December, 1805, Napoleon had but from sixty-five
to seventy thousand men, and the combined Austrians and Russians but ninety thousand. At Leipzig, the
biggest of modern battles, when all the French forces on the one side, and the Austrian, Prussian, Russian, and
Swedish on the other, were face to face on the 18th of October, 1813, they made all together about five
hundred thousand men. How can we believe, then, that nineteen centuries ago, Gaul, so weakly populated and
so slightly organized, suddenly sent two hundred and forty thousand men to the assistance of eighty thousand
Gauls besieged in the little town of Alesia by fifty or sixty thousand Romans? But whatever may be the case
with the figures, it is certain that at the very first moment the national impulse answered the appeal of
Vercingetorix, and that the besiegers of Alesia, Caesar and his legions, found that they were themselves all at
once besieged in their intrenchments by a cloud of Gauls hurrying up to the defence of their compatriots. The
struggle was fierce, but short. Every time that the fresh Gallic army attacked the besiegers, Vercingetorix and
Another historian, contemporary with Plutarch, Florus, attributes to Vercingetorix, as he fell down and cast
his arms at Caesar's feet, these words: "Bravest of men, thou hast conquered a brave man." It is not necessary
to have faith in the rhetorical compliment, or to likewise reject the mixture of pride and weakness attributed to
Vercingetorix in the account of Dion Cassius. It would not be the only example of a hero seeking yet some
chance of safety in the extremity of defeat, and abasing himself for the sake of preserving at any price a life on
which fortune might still smile. However it be, Vercingetorix vanquished, dragged out, after ten years'
imprisonment, to grace Caesar's triumph, and put to death immediately afterwards, lives as a glorious patriot
in the pages of that history in which Caesar appears, on this occasion, as a peevish conqueror who took
pleasure in crushing, with cruel disdain, the enemy he had been at so much pains to conquer.
Alesia taken, and Vercingetorix a prisoner, Gaul was subdued. Caesar, however, had in the following year (A.
U. C. 703) a campaign to make to subjugate some peoplets who tried to maintain their local independence. A
year afterwards, again, attempts at insurrection took place in Belgica, and towards the mouth of the Loire; but
they were easily repressed; they had no national or formidable characteristics; Caesar and his lieutenants
willingly contented themselves with an apparent submission, and in the year 705 A. U. C. the Roman legions,
after nine years' occupation in the conquest of Gaul, were able to depart therefrom to Italy and the East for a
plunge into civil war.
CHAPTER V.
Gaul lived, during those five centuries, under very different rules and rulers. They may be summed up under
five names, which correspond with governments very unequal in merit and defect, in good and evil wrought
for their epoch:
1st, the Caesars from Julius to Nero (from 49 B.C. to A.D. 68); 2d, the Flavians, from Vespasian to Domitian
(from A.D. 69 to 95); 3d, the Antonines, from Nerva to Marcus Aurelius (from A.D. 96 to 180); 4th, the
imperial anarchy, or the thirty-nine emperors and the thirty-one tyrants, from Commodus to Carinus and
Numerian (from A.D. 180 to 284); 5th, Diocletian (from A.D. 284 to 305).
Through all these governments, and in spite of their different results for their contemporary subjects, the fact
already pointed out as the general and definitive characteristic of that long epoch, to wit, the moral and social
decadence of Gaul as well as of the Roman empire, never ceased to continue and spread.
On quitting conquered Gaul to become master at Rome, Caesar neglected nothing to assure his conquest and
make it conducive to the establishment of his empire. He formed, of all the Gallic districts that he had
subjugated, a special province which received the name of Gallia Comata (Gaul of the long-hair), whilst the
old province was called Gallia Toyata (Gaul of the toga). Caesar caused to be enrolled amongst his troops a
multitude of Gauls, Belgians, Arvernians, and Aquitanians, of whose bravery he had made proof. He even
formed, almost entirely of Gauls, a special legion called Alauda (lark), because it bore on the helmets a lark
with outspread wings, the symbol of wakefulness. At the same time he gave in Gallia Comata, to the towns
and families that declared for him, all kinds of favors, the rights of Roman citizenship, the title of allies,
clients, and friends, even to the extent of the Julian name, a sign of the most powerful Roman patronage. He
had, however, in the old Roman province, formidable enemies, especially the town of Marseilles, which
declared against him and for Pompey. Caesar had the place besieged by one of his lieutenants, got possession
of it, caused to be delivered over to him its vessels and treasure, and left in it a garrison of two legions. He
established at Narbonne, Arles, Biterrce (Beziers) three colonies of veteran legionaries devoted to his cause,
and near Antipolis (Antibes) a maritime colony called Forum Julii, nowadays Frejus, of which he proposed to
make a rival to Marseilles. Much money was necessary to meet the expenses of such patronage and to satisfy
the troops, old and new, of the conqueror of Gaul and Rome. Now there was at Rome an ancient treasure,
founded more than four centuries previously by the Dictator Camillus, when he had delivered Rome from the
Gauls—a treasure reserved for the expenses of Gallic wars, and guarded with religious respect as
sacred money. In the midst of all discords and disorders at Rome, none had touched it. After his return from
Gaul, Caesar one day ascended the Capitol with his soldiers, and finding, in the temple of Saturn, the door
closed of the place where the treasure was deposited, ordered it to be forced. L. Metellus, tribune of the
people, made strong opposition, conjuring Caesar not to bring on the Republic the penalty of such sacrilege:
but "the Republic has nothing to fear," said Caesar; "I have released it from its oaths by subjugating Gaul.
There are no more Gauls." He caused the door to be forced, and the treasure was abstracted and distributed to
the troops, Gallic and Roman. Whatever Caesar may have said, there were still Gauls, for at the same time
that he was distributing to such of them as he had turned into his own soldiers the money reserved for the
expense of fighting them, he was imposing upon Gallia Comata, under the name of stipendium (soldier's pay),
a levy of forty millions of sesterces—a considerable amount for a devastated country which, according
to Plutarch, did not contain at that time more than three millions of inhabitants, and almost equal to that of the
levies paid by the rest of the Roman provinces.
After Caesar, Augustus, left sole master of the Roman world, assumed in Gaul, as elsewhere, the part of
pacificator, repairer, conservator, and organizer, whilst taking care, with all his moderation, to remain always
the master. He divided the provinces into imperial and senatorial, reserving to himself the entire government
of the former, and leaving the latter under the authority of the senate. Gaul "of the long hair," all that Caesar
had conquered, was imperial province. Augustus divided it into three provinces, Lugdunensian (Lyonese),
Belgian, and Aquitanian. He recognized therein sixty nations or distinct cityships which continued to have
themselves the government of their own affairs, according to their traditions and manners, whilst conforming
The administrative energy of Augustus was not confined to the erection of monuments and to festivals; he
applied himself to the development in Gaul of the material elements of civilization and social order. His most
intimate and able adviser, Agrippa, being settled at Lyons as governor of the Gauls, caused to be opened four
great roads, starting from a milestone placed in the middle of the Lyonnese forum, and going, one centrewards
to Saintes and the ocean, another southwards to Narbonne and the Pyrenees, the third north-westwards and
towards the Channel by Amiens and Boulogne, and the fourth north-westwards and towards the Rhine.
Agrippa founded several colonies, amongst others Cologne, which bore his name; and he admitted to Gallic
territory bands of Germans who asked for an establishment there. Thanks to public security, Romans became
proprietors in the Gallic provinces and introduced to them Italian cultivation. The Gallic chieftains, on their
side, began to cultivate lands which had become their personal property. Towns were built or grew apace and
became encircled by ramparts, under protection of which the populations came and placed themselves. The
most learned and attentive observer of nature and Roman society, Pliny the Elder, attests that under Augustus
Gallic agriculture and industry made vast progress.
But side by side with this work in the cause of civilization and organization, Augustus and his Roman agents
were pursuing a work of quite a contrary tendency. They labored to extirpate from Gaul the spirit of
nationality, independence, and freedom; they took every pains to efface everywhere Gallic memories and
sentiments. Gallic towns were losing their old and receiving Roman names: Augustonemetum, Augusta, and
Augustodunum took the place of Gergovia, Noviodunum, and Bibracte. The national Gallic religion, which
It is incredible that this hostility on the part of the powers that be towards moral sentiments, and this absence
of freedom, should not have gravely compromised the material interest of the Gallic population. Public
administration, however extensive its organization and energy, if it be not under the superintendence and
restraint of public freedom and morality, soon falls into monstrous abuses, which itself is either ignorant of or
wittingly suffers. Examples of this evil, inherent in despotism, abound even under the intelligent and watchful
sway of Augustus. Here is a case in point. He had appointed as procurator, that is, financial commissioner, in
"long-haired" Gaul, a native who, having been originally a slave and afterwards set free by Julius Caesar, had
taken the Roman name of Licinius. This man gave himself up, during his administration, to a course of the
most shameless extortion. The taxes were collected monthly; and so, taking advantage of the change of name
which flattery had caused in the two months of July and August, sacred to Julius Caesar and Augustus
respectively, he made his year consist of fourteen months, so that he might squeeze out fourteen contributions
instead of twelve. "December," said he, "is surely, as its name indicates, the tenth month of the year," and he
added thereto, in honor of the emperor, two others which he called the eleventh and twelfth. During one of the
trips which Augustus made into Gaul, strong complaints were made against Licinius, and his robberies were
denounced to the emperor. Augustus dared not support him, and seemed upon the point of deciding to bring
him to justice, when Licinius conducted him to the place where was deposited all the treasure he had extorted,
and, "See, my lord," said he, "what I have laid up for thee and for the Roman people, for fear lest the Gauls
possessing so much gold should employ it against you both; for thee I have kept it, and to thee I deliver it."
(Thierry, Histoire des Gaulois, t. iii. p. 295; Clerjon, Histoire de Lyon, t. i. p. 178-180.) Augustus accepted the
treasure, and Licinius remained unpunished. In the case of financial abuses or other acts, absolute power
seldom resists such temptations.
We may hear it said, and we may read in the writings of certain modern philosophers and scholars, that the
victorious despotism of the Roman empire was a necessary and salutary step in advance, and that it brought
about the unity and enfranchisement of the human race. Believe it not. There is mingled good and evil in all
the events and governments of this world, and good often arises side by side with or in the wake of evil, but it
is never from the evil that the good comes; injustice and tyranny have never produced good fruits. Be assured
that whenever they have the dominion, whenever the moral rights and personal liberties of men are trodden
under foot by material force, be it barbaric or be it scientific, there can result only prolonged evils and
deplorable obstacles to the return of moral right and moral force, which, God be thanked, can never he
obliterated from the nature and the history of man. The despotic imperial administration upheld for a long
while the Roman empire, and not without renown; but it corrupted, enervated, and impoverished the Roman
populations, and left them, after five centuries, as incapable of defending themselves as they were of
governing.
Tiberius pursued in Gaul, but with less energy and less care for the provincial administration, the pacific and
moderate policy of Augustus. He had to extinguish in Belgica, and even in the Lyonnese province, two
insurrections kindled by the sparks that remained of national and Druidic spirit. He repressed them effectually,
and without any violent display of vengeance. He made a trip to Gaul, took measures, quite insufficient,
however, for defending the Rhine frontier from the incessantly repeated incursions of the Germans, and
He did just one sensible and useful thing during the whole of his stay in Gaul: he had a light-house
constructed to illumine the passage between Gaul and Great Britain. Some traces of it, they say, have been
discovered.
His successor, Claudius, brother of the great Germanicus, and married to his own niece, the second Agrippina,
was, as has been already stated, born at Lyons, at the very moment when his father, Drusus, was celebrating
there the erection of an altar to Augustus. During his whole reign he showed to the city of his birth the most
lively good-will, and the constant aim as well as principal result of this good-will was to render the city of
Lyons more and more Roman by effacing all Gallic characteristics and memories. She was endowed with
Roman rights, monuments, and names, the most important or the most ostentatious; she became the colony
supereminently, the great municipal town of the Gauls, the Claudian town; but she lost what had remained of
her old municipal government, that is of her administrative and commercial independence. Nor was she the
only one in Gaul to experience the good-will of Claudius. This emperor, the mark of scorn from his infancy,
whom his mother, Antonia, called "a shadow of a man, an unfinished sketch of nature's drawing," and of
whom his grand-uncle, Augustus, used to say, "We shall be forever in doubt, without any certainty of
knowing whether he be or be not equal to public duties," Claudius, the most feeble indeed of the Caesars, in
body, mind, and character, was nevertheless he who had intermittent glimpses of the most elevated ideas and
the most righteous sentiments, and who strove the most sincerely to make them take the form of deeds. He
undertook to assure to all free men of "long-haired" Gaul the same Roman privileges that were enjoyed by the
inhabitants of Lyons; and amongst others, that of entering the senate of Rome and holding the great public
offices. He made a formal proposal to that effect to the senate, and succeeded, not without difficulty, in
getting it adopted. The speech that he delivered on this occasion has been to a great extent preserved to us, not
Claudius, however, was neither liberal nor humane towards a notable portion of the Gallic populations, to wit,
the Druids. During his stay in Gaul he proscribed them and persecuted them without intermission; forbidding,
under pain of death, their form of worship and every exterior sign of their ceremonies. He drove them away
and pursued them even into Great Britain, whither he conducted, A.D. 43, a military expedition, almost the
only one of his reign, save the continued struggle of his lieutenants on the Rhine against the Germans. It was
evidently amongst the corporation of Druids and under the influence of religious creeds and traditions, that
there was still pursued and harbored some of the old Gallic spirit, some passion for national independence,
and some hatred of the Roman yoke. In proportion as Claudius had been popular in Gaul did his adopted son
and successor, Nero, quickly become hated. There is nothing to show that he even went thither, either on the
business of government or to obtain the momentary access of favor always excited in the mob by the presence
and prestige of power. It was towards Greece and the East that a tendency was shown in the tastes and trips of
Nero, imperial poet, musician, and actor. L. Verus, one of the military commandants in Belgica, had
conceived a project of a canal to unite the Moselle to the Saone, and so the Mediterranean to the ocean; but
intrigues in the province and the palace prevented its execution, and in the place of public works useful to
Gaul, Nero caused a new census to be made of the population whom he required to squeeze to pay for his
extravagance. It was in his reign, as is well known, that a fierce fire consumed a great part of Rome and her
monuments. The majority of historians accuse Nero of having himself been the cause of it; but at any rate he
looked on with cynical indifference, as if amused at so grand a spectacle, and taking pleasure in comparing it
to the burning of Troy. He did more: he profited by it so far as to have built for himself, free of expense, that
magnificent palace called "The Palace of Gold," of which he said, when he saw it completed, "At last I am
going to be housed as a man should be." Five years before the burning of Rome, Lyons had been a prey to a
similar scourge, and Seneca wrote to his friend Lucilius, "Lugdunum, which was one of the show-places of
Gaul, is sought for in vain to-day; a single night sufficed for the disappearance of a vast city; it perished in
less time than I take to tell the tale." Nero gave upwards of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars towards the
reconstruction of Lyons, a gift that gained him the city's gratitude, which was manifested, it is said, when his
fall became imminent. It was, however, J. Vindex, a Gaul of Vienne, governor of the Lyonnese province, who
was the instigator of the insurrection which was fatal to Nero, and which put Galba in his place.
When Nero was dead there was no other Caesar, no naturally indicated successor to the empire. The influence
of the name of Caesar had spent itself in the crimes, madnesses, and incapacity of his descendants. Then
began a general search for emperors; and the ambition to be created spread abroad amongst the men of note in
the Roman world. During the eighteen months that followed the death of Nero, three
pretenders—Galba, Otho, and Vitellius—ran this formidable risk. Galba was a worthy old
Roman senator, who frankly said, "If the vast body of the empire could be kept standing in equilibrium
without a head, I were worthy of the chief place in the state." Otho and Vitellius were two epicures, both
indolent and debauched, the former after an elegant, and the latter after a beastly fashion. Galba was raised to
the purple by the Lyonnese and Narbonnese provinces, Vitellius by the legions cantoned in the Belgic
province: to such an extent did Gaul already influence the destinies of Rome. All three met disgrace and death
within the space of eighteen months; and the search for an emperor took a turn towards the East, where the
command was held by Vespasian (Titus Flavius Vespasianus, of Rieti in the duchy of Spoleto), a general
sprung from a humble Italian family, who had won great military distinction, and who, having been
Neither Vespasian nor his sons, Titus and Domitian, visited Gaul, as their predecessors had. Domitian alone
put in a short appearance. The eastern provinces of the empire and the wars on the frontier of the Danube,
towards which the invasions of the Germans were at that time beginning to be directed, absorbed the attention
of the new emperors. Gaul was far, however, from remaining docile and peaceful at this epoch. At the
vacancy that occurred after Nero and amid the claims of various pretenders, the authority of the Roman name
and the pressure of the imperial power diminished rapidly; and the memory and desire of independence were
reawakened. In Belgica the German peoplets, who had been allowed to settle on the left bank of the Rhine,
were very imperfectly subdued, and kept up close communication with the independent peoplets of the right
bank. The eight Roman legions cantoned in that province were themselves much changed; many barbarians
had been enlisted amongst them, and did gallant service; but they were indifferent, and always ready for a new
master and a new country. There were not wanting symptoms, soon followed by opportunities for action, of
this change in sentiment and fact. In the very centre of Gaul, between the Loire and the Allier, a peasant, who
has kept in history his Gallic name of Marie or Maricus, formed a band, and scoured the country, proclaiming
national independence. He was arrested by the local authorities and handed over to Vitellius, who had him
thrown to the beasts. But in the northern part of Belgica, towards the mouths of the Rhine, where a Batavian
peoplet lived, a man of note amongst his compatriots and in the service of the Romans, amongst whom he had
received the name of Claudius Civilis, embraced first secretly, and afterwards openly, the cause of
insurrection. He had vengeance to take for Nero's treatment, who had caused his brother, Julius Paulus, to be
beheaded, and himself to be put in prison, whence he had been liberated by Galba. He made a vow to let his
hair grow until he was revenged. He had but one eye, and gloried in the fact, saying that it had been so with
Hannibal and with Sertorius, and that his highest aspiration was to be like them. He pronounced first for
Vitellius against Otho, then for Vespasian against Vitellius, and then for the complete independence of his
nation against Vespasian. He soon had, amongst the Germans on the two banks of the Rhine and amongst the
Gauls themselves, secret or declared allies. He was joined by a young Gaul from the district of Langres, Julius
Sabinus, who boasted that, during the great war with the Gauls, his great-grandmother had taken the fancy of
Julius Caesar, and that he owed his name to him. News had just reached Gaul of the burning down, for the
second time, of the Capitol during the disturbances at Rome on the death of Nero. The Druids came forth from
the retreats where they had hidden since Claudius' proscription, and reappeared in the towns and
country-places, proclaiming that "the Roman empire was at an end, that the Gallic empire was beginning, and
that the day had come when the possession of all the world should pass into the hands of the Transalpine
nations." The insurgents rose in the name of the Gallic empire, and Julius Sabinus assumed the title of Caesar.
War commenced. Confusion, hesitation, and actual desertion reached the colonies and extended positively to
the Roman legions. Several towns, even Troves and Cologne, submitted or fell into the hands of the
insurgents. Several legions, yielding to bribery, persuasion, or intimidation, went over to them, some with a
bad grace, others with the blood of their officers on their hands. The gravity of the situation was not
misunderstood at Rome. Petilius Cerealis, a commander of renown for his campaigns on the Rhine, was sent
off to Belgica with seven fresh legions. He was as skilful in negotiation and persuasion as he was in battle.
The struggle that ensued was fierce, but brief; and nearly all the towns and legions that had been guilty of
defection returned to their Roman allegiance. Civilis, though not more than half vanquished, himself asked
leave to surrender. The Batavian might, as was said at the time, have inundated the country, and drowned the
Roman armies. Vespasian, therefore, not being inclined to drive men or matters to extremity, gave Civilis
leave to go into retirement and live in peace amongst the marshes of his own land. The Gallic chieftains alone,
the projectors of a Gallic empire, were rigorously pursued and chastised. There was especially one, Julius
Sabinus, the pretended descendant of Julius Caesar, whose capture was heartily desired. After the ruin of his
hopes he took refuge in some vaults connected with one of his country houses. The way in was known only to
two devoted freedmen of his, who set fire to the buildings, and spread a report that Sabinus had poisoned
himself, and that his dead body had been devoured by the flames. He had a wife, a young Gaul named
Eponina, who was in frantic despair at the rumor; but he had her informed, by the mouth of one of his
But Vespasian was merciful only from prudence, and not by nature or from magnanimity; and he sent Sabinus
to execution. Eponina asked that she might die with her husband, saying, "Caesar, do me this grace; for I have
In fact the Caesars and the Flavians met the same fate; the two lines began and ended alike; the former with
Augustus and Nero, the latter with Vespasian and Domitian; first a despot, able, cold, and as capable of
cruelty as of moderation, then a tyrant, atrocious and detested. And both were extinguished without a
descendant. Then a rare piece of good fortune befell the Roman world. Domitian, two years before he was
assassinated by some of his servants whom he was about to put to death, grew suspicious of an aged and
honorable senator, Cocceius Nerva, who had been twice consul, and whom he had sent into exile, first to
Tarenturn, and then in Gaul, preparatory, probably, to a worse fate. To this victim of proscription application
was made by the conspirators who had just got rid of Domitian, and had to get another emperor. Nerva
accepted, but not without hesitation, for he was sixty-four years old; he had witnessed the violent death of six
emperors, and his grandfather, a celebrated jurist, and for a long while a friend of Tiberius, had killed himself,
it is said, for grief at the iniquitous and cruel government of his friend. The short reign of Nerva was a wise, a
just, and a humane, but a sad one, not for the people, but for himself. He maintained peace and order, recalled
exiles, suppressed informers, re-established respect for laws and morals, turned a deaf ear to self-interested
suggestions of vengeance, spoliation, and injustice, proceeding at one time from those who had made him
emperor, at another from the Praetorian soldiers and the Roman mob, who regretted Domitian just as they had
Nero. But Nerva did not succeed in putting a stop to mob-violence or murders prompted by cupidity or hatred.
Finding his authority insulted and his life threatened, he formed a resolution which has been described and
explained by a learned and temperate historian of the last century, Lenain de Tillemont (Histoire des
Empereurs, &c., t. ii. p. 59), with so much justice and precision that it is a pleasure to quote his own words.
"Seeing," says he, "that his age was despised, and that the empire required some one who combined strength
of mind and body, Nerva, being free from that blindness which prevents one from discussing and measuring
one's own powers, and from that thirst for dominion which often prevails over even those who are nearest to
the grave, resolved to take a partner in the sovereign power, and showed his wisdom by making choice of
Trajan." By this choice, indeed, Nerva commenced and inaugurated the finest period of the Roman empire,
the period that contemporaries entitled the golden age, and that history has named the age of the Antonines. It
is desirable to become acquainted with the real character of this period, for to it belong the two greatest
historical events—the dissolution of ancient pagan, and the birth of modern Christian society.
Five notable sovereigns, Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius swayed the Roman
empire during this period (A.D. 96-150). What Nerva was has just been described; and he made no mistake in
adopting Trajan as his successor. Trajan, unconnected by origin, as Nerva also had been, with old Rome, was
born in Spain, near Seville, and by military service in the East had made his first steps towards fortune and
renown. He was essentially a soldier—a moral and a modest soldier; a friend to justice and the public
weal; grand in what he undertook for the empire he governed; simple and modest on his own score; respectful
towards the civil authority and the laws; untiring and equitable in the work of provincial administration;
without any philosophical system or pretensions; full of energy and boldness, honesty and good sense. He
stoutly defended the empire against the Germans on the banks of the Danube, won for it the province of
Dacia, and, being more taken up with the East than the West, made many Asiatic conquests, of which his
successor, Hadrian, lost no time in abandoning, wisely no doubt, a portion. Hadrian, adopted by Trajan, and a
Spaniard too, was intellectually superior and morally very inferior to him. He was full of ambition, vanity,
invention, and restlessness; he was sceptical in thought and cynical in manners; and he was overflowing with
political, philosophical, and literary views and pretensions. He passed the twenty-one years of his reign
chiefly in travelling about the empire, in Asia, Africa, Greece, Spain, Gaul, and Great Britain, opening roads,
raising ramparts and monuments, founding schools of learning and museums, and encouraging among the
provinces, as well as at Rome, the march of administration, legislation, and intellect, more for his own
It has been said that Marcus Aurelius was philosophy enthroned. Without any desire to contest or detract from
that compliment, let it be added that he was conscientiousness enthroned. It is his grand and original
characteristic that he governed the Roman empire and himself with a constant moral solicitude, ever anxious
to realize that ideal of personal virtue and general justice which he had conceived, and to which he aspired.
His conception, indeed, of virtue and justice was incomplete, and even false in certain cases; and in more than
one instance, such as the persecution of the Christians, he committed acts quite contrary to the moral law
which he intended to put in practice towards all men; but his respect for the moral law was profound, and his
intention to shape his acts according to it, serious and sincere. Let us cull a few phrases from that collection of
his private thoughts, which he entitled For Self, and which is really the most faithful picture man ever left of
himself and the pains he took with himself. "There is," says he, "relationship between all beings endowed with
reason. The world is like a superior city within which the other cities are but families. . . . I have conceived the
idea of a government founded on laws of general and equal application. Beware lest thou Caesarze thyself, for
it is what happens only too often. Keep thyself simple, good, unaltered, worthy, grave, a friend to justice,
pious, kindly disposed, courageous enough for any duty. . . . Reverence the gods, preserve mankind. Life is
short; the only possible good fruit of our earthly existence is holiness of intention and deeds that tend to the
common weal. . . . My soul, be thou covered with shame! Thy life is well nigh gone, and thou hast not yet
learned how to live." Amongst men who have ruled great states, it is not easy to mention more than two,
Marcus Aurelius and Saint Louis, who have been thus passionately concerned about the moral condition of
their souls and the moral conduct of their lives. The mind of Marcus Aurelius was superior to that of Saint
Louis; but Saint Louis was a Christian, and his moral ideal was more pure, more complete, more satisfying,
and more strengthening for the soul than the philosophical ideal of Marcus Aurelius. And so Saint Louis was
serene and confident as to his fate and that of the human race, whilst Marcus Aurelius was disquieted and
sad— sad for himself and also for humanity, for his country and for his times: "O, my sole," was his
cry, "wherefore art thou troubled, and why am I so vexed?"
We are here brought closer to the fact which has already been foreshadowed, and which characterizes the
moral and social condition of the Roman world at this period. It would be a great error to take the five
emperors just spoken of—Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius—as
representatives of the society amidst which they lived, and as giving in a certain degree the measure of its
enlightenment, its morality, its prosperity, its disposition, and condition in general. Those five princes were
not only picked men, superior in mind and character to the majority of their contemporaries, but they were
men almost isolated in their generation; in them there was a resumption of all that had been acquired by Greek
and Roman antiquity of enlightenment and virtue, practical wisdom and philosophical morality: they were the
heirs and the survivors of the great minds and the great politicians of Athens and Rome, of the Areopagus and
the Senate. They were not in intellectual and moral harmony with the society they governed, and their action
upon it served hardly to preserve it partially and temporarily from the evils to which it was committed by its
own vices and to break its fall. When they were thoughtful and modest as Marcus Aurelius was, they were
gloomy and disposed to discouragement, for they had a secret foreboding of the uselessness of their efforts.
What must have been the decay of population and of agriculture in the provinces, when even in Italy there was
need of such strong protective efforts, which were nevertheless so slightly successful?
Pliny had seen what was the fatal canker of the Roman empire in the country as well as in the towns: slavery
or semi-slavery.
Landed property was overwhelmed with taxes, was subject to conditions which branded it with a sort of
servitude, and was cultivated by a servile population, in whose hands it became almost barren. The large
holders were thus disgusted, and the small ruined or reduced to a condition more and more degraded. Add to
this state of things in the civil department a complete absence of freedom and vitality in the political; no
elections, no discussion, no public responsibility; characters weakened by indolence and silence, or destroyed
by despotic power, or corrupted by the intrigues of court or army. Take a step farther; cast a glance over the
moral department; no religious creeds and nothing left of even Paganism but its festivals and frivolous or
shameful superstitions. The philosophy of Greece and the old Roman manner of life had raised up, it is true, in
the higher ranks of society Stoics and jurists, the former the last champions of morality and the dignity of
human nature, the latter the last enlightened servants of the civil community. But neither the doctrines of the
Stoics nor the science and able reasoning of the jurists were lights and guides within the reach and for the use
of the populace, who remained a prey to the vices and miseries of servitude or public disorders, oscillating
between the wearisomeness of barren ignorance and the corruptiveness of a life of adventure. All the causes of
decay were at this time spreading throughout Roman society; not a single preservative or regenerative
principle of national life was in any force or any esteem.
After the death of Marcus Aurelius the decay manifested and developed itself, almost without interruption, for
the space of a century, the outward and visible sign of it being the disorganization and repeated falls of the
government itself. The series of emperors given to the Roman world by heirship or adoption, from Augustus
to Marcus Aurelius, was succeeded by what may be termed an imperial anarchy; in the course of one hundred
and thirty-two years the sceptre passed into the hands of thirty-nine sovereigns with the title of emperor
(Augustus), and was clutched at by thirty-one pretenders, whom history has dubbed tyrants, without other
It is said that to excite the confidence and zeal of their bands, the two chiefs of the Bagaudians had medals
struck, and that one exhibited the head of Amandus, "Emperor, Caesar, Augustus, pious and prosperous," with
the word "Hope" on the other side.
When public evils have reached such a pitch, and nevertheless the day has not yet arrived for the entire
disappearance of the system that causes them, there arises nearly always a new power which, in the name of
necessity, applies some remedy to an intolerable condition. A legion cantoned amongst the Tungrians
(Tongres), in Belgica, had on its muster-roll a Dalmatian named Diocletian, not yet very high in rank, but
already much looked up to by his comrades on account of his intelligence and his bravery. He lodged at a
woman's, who was, they said, a Druidess, and had the prophetic faculty. One day when he was settling his
account with her, she complained of his extreme parsimony: "Thou'rt too stingy, Diocletian," said she; and he
answered laughing, "I'll be prodigal when I'm emperor." "Laugh not," rejoined she: "thou'lt be emperor when
thou hast slain a wild boar" (aper). The conversation got about amongst Diocletian's comrades. He made his
way in the army, showing continual ability and valor, and several times during his changes of quarters and
frequent hunting expeditions he found occasion to kill wild boars; but he did not immediately become
emperor, and several of his contemporaries, Aurelian, Tacitus, Probus, Carus, and Numerian, reached the goal
before him. "I kill the wild boars," said he to one of his friends, "and another eats them." The last mentioned
of these ephemeral emperors, Numerian, had for his father-in-law and inseparable comrade a Praetorian
prefect named Arrius Aper. During a campaign in Mesopotamia Numerian was assassinated, and the voice of
the army pronounced Aper guilty. The legions assembled to deliberate about Numerian's death and to choose
his successor. Aper was brought before the assembly under a guard of soldiers. Through the exertions of
zealous friends the candidature of Diocletian found great favor. At the first words pronounced by him from a
raised platform in the presence of the troops, cries of "Diocletian Augustus "were raised in every quarter.
Other voices called on him to express his feelings about Numerian's murderers. Drawing his sword, Diocletian
declared on oath that he was innocent of the emperor's death, but that he knew who was guilty and would find
"Nothing is more difficult than to govern," was a remark his comrades had often heard made by him amidst so
many imperial catastrophes. Emperor in his turn, Diocletian treasured up this profound idea of the difficulty of
government, and he set to work, ably, if not successfully, to master it. Convinced that the empire was too vast,
and that a single man did not suffice to make head against the two evils that were destroying it,—war
against barbarians on the frontiers, and anarchy within,—he divided the Roman world into two
portions, gave the West to Maximian, one of his comrades, a coarse but valiant soldier, and kept the East
himself. To the anarchy that reigned within he opposed a general despotic administrative organization, a vast
hierarchy of civil and military agents, everywhere present, everywhere masters, and dependent upon the
emperor alone. By his incontestable and admitted superiority, Diocletian remained the soul of these two
bodies. At the end of eight years he saw that the two empires were still too vast; and to each Augustus he
added a Caesar,—Galerius and Constantius Chlorus,—who, save a nominal, rather than real,
subordination to the two emperors, had, each in his own state, the imperial power with the same
administrative system. In this partition of the Roman world, Gaul had the best of it: she had for master,
Constantius Chlorus, a tried warrior, but just, gentle, and disposed to temper the exercise of absolute power
with moderation and equity. He had a son, Constantine, at this time eighteen years of age, whom he was
educating carefully for government as well as for war. This system of the Roman empire, thus divided
between four masters, lasted thirteen years; still fruitful in wars and in troubles at home, but without victories,
and with somewhat less of anarchy. In spite of this appearance of success and durability, absolute power
failed to perform its task; and, weary of his burden and disgusted with the imperfection of his work,
Diocletian abdicated A.D. 303. No event, no solicitations of his old comrades in arms and empire, could draw
him from his retreat on his native soil of Salona, in Dalmatia. "If you could see the vegetables planted by
these hands," said he to Maximian and Galerius, "you would not make the attempt." He had persuaded or
rather dragged his first colleague, Maximian, into abdication after him; and so Galerius in the East, and
Constantius Chlorus in the West, remained sole emperors. After the retirement of Diocletian, ambitions,
rivalries, and intrigues were not slow to make head; Maximian reappeared on the scene of empire, but only to
speedily disappear (A.D. 310), leaving in his place his son Maxentius. Constantius Chlorus had died A.D.
306, and his son, Constantine, had immediately been proclaimed by his army Caesar and Augustus. Galerius
died A.D. 311 and Constantine remained to dispute the mastery with Maxentius in the West, and in the East
with Maximinus and Licinius, the last colleagues taken by Diocletian and Galerius. On the 29th of October,
A.D. 312, after having gained several battles against Maxentius in Italy, at Milan, Brescia, and Verona,
Constantine pursued and defeated him before Rome, on the borders of the Tiber, at the foot of the Milvian
bridge; and the son of Maximian, drowned in the Tiber, left to the son of Constantins Chlorus the Empire of
the West, to which that of the East was destined to be in a few years added, by the defeat and death of
Licinius. Constantine, more clear-sighted and more fortunate than any of his predecessors, had understood his
era, and opened his eyes to the new light which was rising upon the world. Far from persecuting the
Christians, as Diocletian and Galerius had done, he had given them protection, countenance, and audience;
and towards him turned all their hopes. He had even, it is said, in his last battle against Maxentius, displayed
the Christian banner, the cross, with this inscription: Hoc signo vinces ("with this device thou shalt conquer ").
There is no knowing what was at that time the state of his soul, and to what extent it was penetrated by the
first rays of Christian faith; but it is certain that he was the first amongst the masters of the Roman world to
perceive and accept its influence. With him Paganism fell, and Christianity mounted the throne. With him the
decay of Roman society stops, and the era of modern society commences.
CHAPTER VI.
Druidism, considered as a religion, was a mass of confusion, wherein the instinctive notions of the human race
concerning the origin and destiny of the world and of mankind were mingled with the Oriental dreams of
The Greco-Roman Paganism was, at this time, far more powerful than Druidism in Gaul, and yet more
lukewarm and destitute of all religious vitality. It was the religion of the conquerors and of the state, and was
invested, in that quality, with real power; but, beyond that, it had but the power derived from popular customs
and superstitions. As a religious creed, the Latin Paganism was at bottom empty, indifferent, and inclined to
tolerate all religions in the state, provided only that they, in their turn, were indifferent at any rate towards
itself, and that they did not come troubling the state, either by disobeying her rulers or by attacking her old
deities, dead and buried beneath their own still standing altars.
Such were the two religions with which, in Gaul, nascent Christianity had to contend. Compared with them it
was, to all appearance, very small and very weak; but it was provided with the most efficient weapons for
fighting and beating them, for it had exactly the moral forces which they lacked. Christianity, instead of being,
like Druidism, a religion exclusively national and hostile to all that was foreign, proclaimed a universal
religion, free from all local and national partiality, addressing itself to all men in the name of the same God,
and offering to all the same salvation. It is one of the strangest and most significant facts in history, that the
religion most universally human, most dissociated from every consideration but that of the rights and
well-being of the human race in its entirety—that such a religion, be it repeated, should have come
forth from the womb of the most exclusive, most rigorously and obstinately national religion that ever
appeared in the world, that is, Judaism. Such, nevertheless, was the birth of Christianity; and this wonderful
contrast between the essence and the earthly origin of Christianity was without doubt one of its most powerful
attractions and most efficacious means of success.
Against Paganism Christianity was armed with moral forces not a whit less great. Confronting mythological
traditions and poetical or philosophical allegories, appeared a religion truly religious, concerned solely with
the relations of mankind to God and with their eternal future. To the pagan indifference of the Roman world
the Christians opposed the profound conviction of their faith, and not only their firmness in defending it
against all powers and all dangers, but also their ardent passion for propagating it without any motive but the
yearning to make their fellows share in its benefits and its hopes. They confronted, nay, they welcomed
martyrdom, at one time to maintain their own Christianity, at another to make others Christians around them;
propagandism was for them a duty almost as imperative as fidelity. And it was not in memory of old and
obsolete mythologies, but in the name of recent deeds and persons, in obedience to laws proceeding from
God, One and Universal, in fulfilment and continuation of a contemporary and superhuman
history,—that of Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Son of Man,—that the Christians of the first
two centuries labored to convert to their faith the whole Roman world. Marcus Aurelius was contemptuously
astonished at what he called the obstinacy of the Christians; he knew not from what source these nameless
It was under Marcus Aurelius, the most philosophical and most conscientious of the emperors, that there was
enacted for the first time in Gaul, against nascent Christianity, that scene of tyranny and barbarity which was
to be renewed so often and during so many centuries in the midst of Christendom itself. In the eastern
provinces of the Empire and in Italy the Christians had already been several times persecuted, now with
cold-blooded cruelty, now with some slight hesitation and irresolution. Nero had caused them to be burned in
the streets of Rome, accusing them of the conflagration himself had kindled, and, a few months before his fall,
St. Peter and St. Paul had undergone martyrdom at Rome. Domitian had persecuted and put to death
Christians even in his own family, and though invested with the honors of the consulate. Righteous Trajan,
when consulted by Pliny the Younger on the conduct he should adopt in Bithynia towards the Christians, had
answered, "It is impossible, in this sort of matter, to establish any certain general rule; there must be no quest
set on foot against them, and no unsigned indictment must be accepted; but if they be accused and convicted,
they must be punished." To be punished, it sufficed that they were convicted of being Christians; and it was
Trajan himself who condemned St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, to be brought to Rome and thrown to the
beasts, for the simple reason that he was highly Christian. Marcus Aurelius, not only by virtue of his
philosophical conscientiousness, but by reason of an incident in his history, seemed bound to be farther than
any other from persecuting the Christians. During one of his campaigns on the Danube, A.D. 174, his army
was suffering cruelly from fatigue and thirst; and at the very moment when they were on the point of engaging
in a great battle against the barbarians, the rain fell in abundance, refreshed the Roman soldiers, and conduced
to their victory. There was in the Roman army a legion, the twelfth, called the Melitine or the Thundering,
which bore on its roll many Christian soldiers. They gave thanks for the rain and the victory to the one
omnipotent God who had heard their prayers, whilst the pagans rendered like honor to Jupiter, the rain-giver
and the thunderer. The report about these Christians got spread abroad and gained credit in the Empire, so
much so that there was attributed to Marcus Aurelius a letter, in which, by reason, no doubt, of this incident,
he forbade persecution of the Christians. Tertullian, a contemporary witness, speaks of this letter in perfect
confidence; and the Christian writers of the following century did not hesitate to regard it as authentic.
Nowadays a strict examination of its existing text does not allow such a character to be attributed to it. At any
rate the persecutions of the Christians were not forbidden, for in the year 177, that is, only three years after the
victory of Marcus Aurelius over the Germans, there took place, undoubtedly by his orders, the persecution
which caused at Lyons the first Gallic martyrdom. This was the fourth, or, according to others, the fifth great
imperial persecution of the Christians.
"The servants of Christ, dwelling at Vienne and Lyons in Gaul, to the brethren settled in Asia and Phrygia,
who have the same faith and hope of redemption that we have, peace, grace, and glory from God the Father
and Jesus Christ our Lord!
"None can tell to you in speech or fully set forth to you in writing the weight of our misery, the madness and
rage of the Gentiles against the saints, and all that hath been suffered by the blessed martyrs. Our enemy doth
rush upon us with all the fury of his powers, and already giveth us a foretaste and the first-fruits of all the
license with which he doth intend to set upon us. He hath omitted nothing for the training of his agents against
us, and he doth exercise them in a sort of preparatory work against the servants of the Lord. Not only are we
driven from the public buildings, from the baths, and from the forum, but it is forbidden to all our people to
appear publicly in any place whatsoever.
"The grace of God hath striven for us against the devil: at the same time that it hath sustained the weak, it hath
opposed to the Evil One, as it were, pillars of strength—men strong and valiant, ready to draw on
themselves all his attacks. They have had to bear all manner of insult; they have deemed but a small matter
that which others find hard and terrible; and they have thought only of going to Christ, proving by their
example that the sufferings of this world are not worthy to be put in the balance with the glory which is to be
manifested in us. They have endured, in the first place, all the outrages that could be heaped upon them by the
multitude, outcries, blows, thefts, spoliation, stoning, imprisonment, all that the fury of the people could
devise against hated enemies. Then, dragged to the forum by the military tribune and the magistrates of the
city, they have been questioned before the people and cast into prison until the coming of the governor. He,
from the moment our people appeared before him, committed all manner of violence against them. Then stood
forth one of our brethren, Vettius Epagathus, full of love towards God and his neighbor, living a life so pure
and strict that, young as he was, men held him to be the equal of the aged Zacharias.— He could not
bear that judgment so unjust should go forth against us, and, moved with indignation, he asked leave to defend
his brethren, and to prove that there was in them no kind of irreligion or impiety. Those present at the tribunal,
amongst whom he was known and celebrated, cried out against him, and the governor himself, enraged at so
just a demand, asked him no more than this question, 'Art thou a Christian?' Straightway with a loud voice, he
declared himself a Christian, and was placed amongst the number of the martyrs. . . .
"Afterwards the rest began to be examined and classed. The first, firm and well prepared, made hearty and
solemn confession of their faith. Others, ill prepared and with little firmness, showed that they lacked strength
for such a fight. About ten of them fell away, which caused us incredible pain and mourning. Their example
broke down the courage of others, who, not being yet in bonds, though they had already had much to suffer,
kept close to the martyrs, and withdrew not out of their sight. Then were we all stricken with dread for the
issue of the trial: not that we had great fear of the torments inflicted, but because, prophesying the result
according to the degree of courage of the accused, we feared much falling away. They took, day by day, those
of our brethren who were worthy to replace the weak; so that all the best of the two churches, those whose
care and zeal had founded them, were taken and confined. They took, likewise, some of our slaves, for the
governor had ordered that they should be all summoned to attend in public; and they, fearing the torments
they saw the saints undergo, and instigated by the soldiers, accused us falsely of odious deeds, such as the
"The fury of the multitude, of the governor, and of the soldiers, fell chiefly upon Sanctus, a deacon of Vienne;
upon Maturus, a neophyte still, but already a valiant champion of Christ; upon Attalus also, born at Pergamus,
but who hath ever been one of the pillars of our Church; upon Blandina, lastly, in whom Christ hath made it
appear that persons who seem vile and despised of men are just those whom God holds in the highest honor
by reason of the excellent love they bear Him, which is manifested in their firm virtue, and not in vain show.
All of us, and even Blandina's mistress here below, who fought valiantly with the other martyrs, feared that
this poor slave, so weak of body, would not be in a condition to freely confess her faith; but she was sustained
by such vigor of soul that the executioners, who from morn till eve put her to all manner of torture, failed in
their efforts, and declared themselves beaten, not knowing what further punishment to inflict, and marvelling
that she still lived, with her body pierced through and through, and torn piecemeal by so many tortures, of
which a single one should have sufficed to kill her. But that blessed saint, like a valiant athlete, took fresh
courage and strength from the confession of her faith; all feeling of pain vanished, and ease returned to her at
the mere utterance of the words, 'I am a Christian, and no evil is wrought amongst us.'
"As for Sanctus, the executioners hoped that in the midst of the tortures inflicted upon him—the most
atrocious which man could devise—they would hear him say something unseemly or unlawful; but so
firmly did he resist them, that, without even saying his name, or that of his nation or city, or whether he was
bond or free, he only replied in the Roman tongue, to all questions, 'I am a Christian.' Therein was, for him,
his name, his country, his condition, his whole being; and never could the Gentiles wrest from him another
word. The fury of the governor and the executioners was redoubled against him; and, not knowing how to
torment him further, they applied to his most tender members bars of red-hot iron. His members burned; but
he, upright and immovable, persisted in his profession of faith, as if living waters from the bosom of Christ
flowed over him and refreshed him. . . . Some days after, these infidels began again to torture him, believing
that if they inflicted upon his blistering wounds the same agonies, they would triumph over him, who seemed
unable to bear the mere touch of their hands; and they hoped, also, that the sight of this torturing alive would
terrify his comrades. But, contrary to general expectation, the body of Sanctus, rising suddenly up, stood erect
and firm amidst these repeated torments, and recovered its old appearance and the use of its members, as if, by
Divine grace, this second laceration of his flesh had caused healing rather than suffering. . . .
"When the tyrants had thus expended and exhausted their tortures against the firmness of the martyrs
sustained by Christ, the devil devised other contrivances. They were cast into the darkest and most
unendurable place in their prison; their feet were dragged out and compressed to the utmost tension of the
muscles; the jailers, as if instigated by a demon, tried every sort of torture, insomuch that several of them, for
whom God willed such an end, died of suffocation in prison. Others, who had been tortured in such a manner
that it was thought impossible they should long survive, deprived as they were of every remedy and aid from
men, but supported nevertheless by the grace of God, remained sound and strong in body as in soul, and
comforted and reanimated their brethren. . . .
"The blessed Pothinus, who held at that time the bishopric of Lyons, being upwards of ninety, and so weak in
body that he could hardly breathe, was himself brought before the tribunal, so worn with old age and sickness
that he seemed nigh to extinction; but he still possessed his soul, wherewith to subserve the triumph of Christ.
Being brought by the soldiers before the tribunal, whither he was accompanied by all the magistrates of the
city and the whole populace, that pursued him with hootings, he offered, as if he had been the very Christ, the
most glorious testimony. At a question from the governor, who asked what the God of the Christians was, he
"Then were manifested a singular dispensation of God and the immeasurable compassion of Jesus Christ; an
example rare amongst brethren, but in accord with the intentions and the justice of the Lord. All those who, at
their first arrest, had denied their faith, were themselves cast into prison and given over to the same sufferings
as the other martyrs, for their denial did not serve them at all. Those who had made profession of being what
they really were—that is, Christians—were imprisoned without being accused of other crimes.
The former, on the contrary, were confined as homicides and wretches, thus suffering a double punishment.
The one sort found repose in the honorable joys of martyrdom, in the hope of promised blessedness, in the
love of Christ, and in the spirit of God the Father; the other were a prey to the reproaches of conscience. It was
easy to distinguish the one from the other by their looks. The one walked joyously, bearing on their faces a
majesty mingled with sweetness, and their very bonds seemed unto them an ornament, even as the broidery
that decks a bride . . . the other, with downcast eyes and humble and dejected air, were an object of contempt
to the Gentiles themselves, who regarded them as cowards who had forfeited the glorious and saving name of
Christians. And so they who were present at this double spectacle were thereby signally strengthened, and
whoever amongst them chanced to be arrested confessed the faith without doubt or hesitation. . . .
"Things having come to this pass, different kinds of death were inflicted on the martyrs, and they offered to
God a crown of divers flowers. It was but right that the most valiant champions, those who had sustained a
double assault and gained a signal victory, should receive a splendid crown of immortality. The neophyte
Maturus and the deacon Sanctus, with Blandina and Attalus, then, were led into the amphitheatre, and thrown
to the beasts, as a sight to please the inhumanity of the Gentiles. . . . Maturus and Sanctus there underwent all
kinds of tortures, as if they had hitherto suffered nothing; or, rather, like athletes who had already been several
times victorious, and were contending for the crown of crowns, they braved the stripes with which they were
beaten, the bites of the beasts that dragged them to and fro, and all that was demanded by the outcries of an
insensate mob, so much the more furious, because it could by no means overcome the firmness of the martyrs
or extort from Sanctus any other speech than that which, on the first day, he had uttered: 'I am a Christian.'
"After this fearful contest, as life was not extinct, their throats were at last cut, when they alone had thus been
offered as a spectacle to the public instead of the variety displayed in the combat of gladiators. Blandina, in
her turn, tied to a stake, was given to the beasts: she was seen hanging, as it were, on a sort of cross, calling
upon God with trustful fervor, and the brethren present were reminded, in the person of a sister, of Him who
had been crucified for their salvation. . . . As none of the beasts would touch the body of Blandina, she was
released from the stake, taken back to prison, and reserved for another occasion. . . . Attalus, whose execution,
seeing that he was a man of mark, was furiously demanded by the people, came forward ready to brave
everything, as a man deriving confidence from the memory of his life, for he had courageously trained himself
to discipline, and had always amongst us borne witness for the truth. He was led all round the amphitheatre,
preceded by a board bearing this inscription in Latin: 'This is Attalus the Christian.' The people pursued him
with the most furious hootings; but the governor, having learnt that he was a Roman citizen, had him taken
back to prison with the rest. Having subsequently written to Caesar, he waited for his decision as to those who
were thus detained.
"This delay was neither useless nor unprofitable, for then shone forth the boundless compassion of Christ.
Those of the brethren who had been but dead members of the Church, were recalled to life by the pains and
help of the living; the martyrs obtained grace for those who had fallen away; and great was the joy in the
"Great glory was gained for Christ by means of those who had at first denied their faith, and who now
confessed it contrary to the expectation of the Gentiles. Those who, having been privately questioned,
declared themselves Christians were added to the number of the martyrs. Those in whom appeared no vestige
of faith, and no fear of God, remained without the pale of the Church. When they were dealing with those who
had been reunited to it, one Alexander, a Phrygian by nation, a physician by profession, who had for many
years been dwelling in Gaul, a man well known to all for his love of God and open preaching of the faith, took
his place in the hall of judgment, exhorting by signs all who filled it to confess their faith, even as if he had
been called in to deliver them of it. The multitude, enraged to see that those who had at first denied, turned
round and proclaimed their faith, cried out against Alexander, whom they accused of the conversion. The
governor forthwith asked him what he was, and at the answer, 'I am a Christian,' condemned him to the beasts.
On the morrow Alexander was again brought up, together with Attalus, whom the governor, to please the
people, had once more condemned to the beasts. After they had both suffered in the amphitheatre all the
torments that could be devised, they were put to the sword. Alexander uttered not a complaint, not a word; he
had the air of one who was talking inwardly with God. Attalus, seated on an iron seat, and waiting for the fire
to consume his body, said, in Latin, to the people, 'See what ye are doing; it is in truth devouring men; as for
us, we devour not men, and we do no evil at all.' He was asked what was the name of God: 'God,' said he, 'is
not like us mortals; He hath no name.'
"After all these martyrs, on the last day of the shows, Blandina was again brought up, together with a young
lad, named Ponticus, about fifteen years old. They had been brought up every day before that they might see
the tortures of their brethren. When they were called upon to swear by the altars of the Gentiles, they
remained firm in their faith, making no account of those pretended gods, and so great was the fury of the
multitude against them, that no pity was shown for the age of the child or the sex of the woman. Tortures were
heaped upon them; they were made to pass through every kind of torment, but the desired end was not gained.
Supported by the exhortations of his sister, who was seen and heard by the Gentiles, Ponticus, after having
endured all magnanimously, gave up the ghost. Blandina, last of all,—like a noble mother that hath
roused the courage of her sons for the fight, and sent them forth to conquer for their king,—passed once
more through all the tortures they had suffered, anxious to go and rejoin them, and rejoicing at each step
towards death. At length, after she had undergone fire, the talons of beasts, and agonizing aspersion, she was
wrapped in a network and thrown to a bull that tossed her in the air; she was already unconscious of all that
befell her, and seemed altogether taken up with watching for the blessings that Christ had in store for her.
Even the Gentiles allowed that never a woman had suffered so much or so long.
"Still their fury and their cruelty towards the saints were not appeased. They devised another way of raging
against them; they cast to the dogs the bodies of those who had died of suffocation in prison, and watched
night and day that none of our brethren might come and bury them. As for what remained of the martyrs'
half-mangled or devoured corpses, they left them exposed under a guard of soldiers, coming to look on them
with insulting eyes, and saying, 'Where is now their God? Of what use to them was this religion for which
they laid down their lives?' We were overcome with grief that we were not able to bury these poor corpses;
nor the darkness of night, nor gold, nor prayers could help us to succeed therein. After being thus exposed for
six days in the open air, given over to all manner of outrage, the corpses of the martyrs were at last burned,
It is not without a painful effort that, even after so many centuries, we can resign ourselves to be witnesses, in
imagination only, of such a spectacle. We can scarce believe that amongst men of the same period and the
same city so much ferocity could be displayed in opposition to so much courage, the passion for barbarity
against the passion for virtue. Nevertheless, such is history; and it should be represented as it really was: first
of all, for truth's sake; then for the due appreciation of virtue and all it costs of effort and sacrifice; and, lastly,
for the purpose of showing what obstacles have to be surmounted, what struggles endured, and what
sufferings borne, when the question is the accomplishment of great moral and social reforms. Marcus Aurelius
was, without any doubt, a virtuous ruler, and one who had it in his heart to be just and humane; but he was an
absolute ruler, that is to say, one fed entirely on his owns ideas, very ill-informed about the facts on which he
had to decide, and without a free public to warn him of the errors of his ideas or the practical results of his
decrees. He ordered the persecution of the Christians without knowing what the Christians were, or what the
persecution would be, and this conscientious philosopher let loose at Lyons, against the most conscientious of
subjects, the zealous servility of his agents, and the atrocious passions of the mob.
The persecution of the Christians did not stop at Lyons, or with Marcus Aurelius; it became, during the third
century, the common practice of the emperors in all parts of the Empire: from A.D. 202 to 312, under the
reigns of Septimius Severus, Maximinus the First, Decius, Valerian, Aurelian, Diocletian, Maximian, and
Galerius, there are reckoned six great general persecutions, without counting others more circumscribed or
less severe. The Emperors Alexander Severns, Philip the Arabian, and Constantius Chlorus were almost the
only exceptions to this cruel system; and nearly always, wherever it was in force, the Pagan mob, in its
brutality or fanatical superstition, added to imperial rigor its own atrocious and cynical excesses.
But Christian zeal was superior in perseverance and efficacy to Pagan persecution. St. Pothinus the Martyr
was succeeded as bishop at Lyons by St. Irenaeus, the most learned, most judicious, and most illustrious of
the early heads of the Church in Gaul. Originally from Asia Minor, probably from Smyrna, he had migrated to
Gaul, at what particular date is not known, and had settled as a simple priest in the diocese of Lyons, where it
was not long before he exercised vast influence, as well on the spot as also during certain missions intrusted to
him, and amongst them one, they say, to the Pope St. Eleutherius at Rome. Whilst Bishop of Lyons, from
A.D. 177 to 202, he employed the five and twenty years in propagating the Christian faith in Gaul, and in
defending, by his writings, the Christian doctrines against the discord to which they had already been
subjected in the East, and which was beginning to penetrate to the West. In 202, during the persecution
instituted by Septimius Severus, St. Irenaeus crowned by martyrdom his active and influential life. It was in
his episcopate that there began what may be called the swarm of Christian missionaries who, towards the end
of the second and during the third centuries, spread over the whole of Gaul, preaching the faith and forming
churches. Some went from Lyons at the instigation of St. Irenaeus; others from Rome, especially under the
pontificate of Pope St. Fabian, himself martyred in 219; St. Felix and St. Fortunatus to Valence, St. Ferreol to
Besancon, St. Marcellus to Chalons-sur-Saone, St. Benignus to Dijon, St. Trophimus to Arles, St. Paul to
Narbonne, St. Saturninus to Toulouse, St. Martial to Limoges, St. Andeol and St. Privatus to the Cevennes, St.
Austremoine to Clermont-Ferrand, St. Gatian to Tours, St. Denis to Paris, and so many others that their names
are scarcely known beyond the pages of erudite historians, or the very spots where they preached, struggled,
and conquered, often at the price of their lives. Such were the founders of the faith and of the Christian
Church in France. At the commencement of the fourth century their work was, if not accomplished, at any rate
triumphant; and when, A.D. 312, Constantine declared himself a Christian, he confirmed the fact of the
conquest of the Roman world, and of Gaul in particular, by Christianity. No doubt the majority of the
inhabitants were not as yet Christians; but it was clear that the Christians were in the ascendant and had
command of the future. Of the two grand elements which were to meet together, on the ruins of Roman
society, for the formation of modern society, the moral element, the Christian religion, had already taken
possession of souls; the devastated territory awaited the coming of new peoples, known to history under the
general name of Germans, whom the Romans called the barbarians.
CHAPTER VII.
That was, apparently, a popular burden at the time, for on the days of military festivals, at Rome and in Gaul,
the children sang, as they danced,—
Aurelian, the hero of these ditties, was indeed much given to the pouring out of blood, for at the approach of a
fresh war he wrote to the senate,—
"I marvel, Conscript Fathers, that ye have so much misgiving about opening the Sibylline books, as if ye were
deliberating in an assembly of Christians, and not in the temple of all the gods. . . . Let inquiry be made of the
sacred books, and let celebration take place of the ceremonies that ought to be fulfilled. Far from refusing, I
offer, with zeal, to satisfy all expenditure required, with captives of every nationality, victims of royal rank. It
is no shame to conquer with the aid of the gods; it is thus that our ancestors began and ended many a war."
Human sacrifices, then, were not yet foreign to Pagan festivals, and probably the blood of more than one
Frankish captive on that occasion flowed in the temple of all the gods.
"I render thanks to the immortal gods, Conscript Fathers, for that they have confirmed your judgment as
regards me. Germany is subdued throughout its whole extent; nine kings of different nations have come and
cast themselves at my feet, or rather at yours, as suppliants, with their foreheads in the dust. Already all those
barbarians are tilling for you, sowing for you, and fighting for you against the most distant nations.
"Order ye, therefore, according to your custom, prayers of thanksgiving, for we have slain four thousand of
the enemy; we have had offered to us sixteen thousand men ready armed; and we have wrested from the
enemy the seventy most important towns. The Gauls, in fact, are completely delivered. The crowns offered to
me by all the cities of Gaul I have submitted, Conscript Fathers, to your grace; dedicate ye them with your
own hands to Jupiter, all-bountiful, all-powerful, and to the other immortal gods and goddesses. All the booty
is re-taken, and, further, we have made fresh captures, more considerable than our first losses; the fields of
Gaul are tilled by the oxen of the barbarians, and German teams bend their necks in slavery to our
husbandmen; divers nations raise cattle for our consumption, and horses to remount our cavalry; our stores are
full of the corn of the barbarians—in one word, we have left to the vanquished nought but the soil; all
their other possessions are ours. We had at first thought it necessary, Conscript Fathers, to appoint a new
Governor of Germany; but we have put off this measure to the time when our ambition shall be more
completely satisfied, which will be, as it seems to us, when it shall have pleased Divine Providence to increase
and multiply the forces of our armies."
After the commencement of the fifth century, from A.D. 406 to 409, it was no longer by incursions limited to
certain points, and sometimes repelled with success, that the Germans harassed the Roman provinces: a
veritable deluge of divers nations, forced one upon another, from Asia into Europe, by wars and migration in
mass, inundated the Empire and gave the decisive signal for its fall. St. Jerome did not exaggerate when he
wrote to Ageruchia, "Nations, countless in number and exceeding fierce, have occupied all the Gauls;
Quadians, Vandals, Sarmatians, Alans, Gepidians, Herulians, Saxons, Burgundians, Allemannians,
Pannonians, and even Assyrians have laid waste all that there is between the Alps and the Pyrenees, the ocean
and the Rhine. Sad destiny of the commonwealth! Mayence, once a noble city, hath been taken and destroyed;
thousands of men were slaughtered in the church. Worms hath fallen after a long siege. The inhabitants of
Rheims, a powerful city, and those of Amiens, Arras, Terouanne, at the extremity of Gaul, Tournay, Spires,
and Strasburg have been carried away to Germany. All hath been ravaged in Aquitania (Novempopulania),
Lyonness, and Narbonness; the towns, save a few, are dispeopled; the sword pursueth them abroad and famine
at home. I cannot speak without tears of Toulouse; if she be not reduced to equal ruin, it is to the merits of her
holy Bishop Exuperus that she oweth it."
Then took place throughout the Roman empire, in the East as well as in the West, in Asia and Africa as well
as in Europe, the last grand struggle between the Roman armies and the barbaric nations. Armies is the proper
term; for, to tell the truth, there was no longer a Roman nation, and very seldom a Roman emperor with some
little capacity for government or war. The long continuance of despotism and slavery had enervated equally
the ruling power and the people; everything depended on the soldiers and their generals. It was in Gaul that
the struggle was most obstinate and most promptly brought to a decisive issue, and the confusion there was as
great as the obstinacy. Barbaric peoplets served in the ranks and barbaric leaders held the command of the
Roman armies: Stilieho was a Goth; Arbogastes and Mellobaudes were Franks; Ricimer was a Suevian. The
Roman generals, Bonifacius, Aetius, AEgidius, Syagrius, at one time fought the barbarians, at another
negotiated with such and such of them, either to entice them to take service against other barbarians, or to
promote the objects of personal ambition, for the Roman generals also, under the titles of patrician, consul, or
proconsul, aspired to and attained a sort of political independence, and contributed to the dismemberment of
the empire in the very act of defending it. No later than A.D. 412, two German nations, the Visigoths and the
Burgundians, took their stand definitively in Gaul, and founded there two new kingdoms: the Visigoths, under
their kings Ataulph and Wallia, in Aquitania and Narbonness; the Burgundians, under their kings Gundichaire
and Gundioch, in Lyonness, from the southern point of Alsatia right into Provence, along the two banks of the
Saone and the left bank of the Rhone, and also in Switzerland. In 451 the arrival in Gaul of the Huns and their
king Attila—already famous, both king and nation, for their wild habits, their fierce valor, and their
successes against the Eastern empire—gravely complicated the situation. The common interest of
resistance against the most barbarous of barbarians, and the renown and energy of Aetius, united, for the
moment, the old and new masters of Gaul; Romans, Gauls, Visigoths, Burgundians, Franks, Alans, Saxons,
and Britons, formed the army led by Aetius against that of Attila, who also had in his ranks Goths,
Burgundians, Gepidians, Alans, and beyond Rhine Franks, gathered together and enlisted on his road. It was a
chaos and a conflict of barbarians, of every name and race, disputing one with another, pell-mell, the remnants
Thirty years after the battle of Chalons, the Franks settled in Gaul were not yet united as one nation; several
tribes with this name, independent one of another, were planted between the Rhine and the Somme; there
Clovis was fifteen or sixteen years old when he became King of the Salian Franks of Tournay. Five years
afterwards his ruling passion, ambition, exhibited itself, together with that mixture of boldness and craft
which was to characterize his whole life. He had two neighbors: one, hostile to the Franks, the Roman
patrician Syagrius, who was left master at Soissons after the death of his father AEgidius, and whom Gregory
of Tours calls "King of the Romans;" the other, a Salian-Frankish chieftain, just as Clovis was, and related to
him, Ragnacaire, who was settled at Cambrai. Clovis induced Ragnacaire to join him in a campaign against
Syagrius. They fought, and Syagrius was driven to take refuge in Southern Gaul with Alaric, king of the
Visigoths. Clovis, not content with taking possession of Soissons, and anxious to prevent any troublesome
return, demanded of Alaric to send Syagrius back to him, threatening war if the request were refused. The
Goth, less bellicose than the Frank, delivered up Syagrius to the envoys of Clovis, who immediately had him
secretly put to death, settled himself at Soissons, and from thence set on foot, in the country between the
Aisne and the Loire, plundering and subjugating expeditions which speedily increased his domains and his
wealth, and extended far and wide his fame as well as his ambition. The Franks who accompanied him were
not long before they also felt the growth of his power; like him they were pagans, and the treasures of the
Christian churches counted for a great deal in the booty they had to divide. On one of their expeditions they
had taken in the church of Rheims, amongst other things, a vase "of marvellous size and beauty." The Bishop
of Rheims, St. Remi, was not quite a stranger to Clovis. Some years before, when he had heard that the son of
Childeric had become king of the Franks of Tournai, he had written to congratulate him: "We are informed,"
said he, "that thou halt undertaken the conduct of affairs; it is no marvel that thou beginnest to be what thy
fathers ever were;" and, whilst taking care to put himself on good terms with the young pagan chieftain, the
bishop added to his felicitations some pious Christian counsel, without letting any attempt at conversion be
mixed up with his moral exhortations. The bishop, informed of the removal of the vase, sent to Clovis a
messenger begging the return, if not of all his church's ornaments, at any rate of that. "Follow us as far as
Soissons," said Clovis to the messenger; "it is there the partition is to take place of what we have captured:
when the lots shall have given me the vase, I will do what the bishop demands." When Soissons was reached,
and all the booty had been placed in the midst of the host, the king said, "Valiant warriors, I pray you not to
refuse me, over and above my share, this vase here." At these words of the king, those who were of sound
mind amongst the assembly answered, "Glorious king, everything we see here is thine, and we ourselves are
submissive to thy commands. Do thou as seemeth good to thee, for there is none that can resist thy power."
When they had thus spoken a certain Frank, light-minded, jealous, and vain, cried out aloud as he struck the
vase with his battle-axe, "Thou shalt have nought of all this save what the lots shall truly give thee." At these
words all were astounded; but the king bore the insult with sweet patience, and, accepting the vase, he gave it
to the messenger, hiding his wound in the recesses of his heart. At the end of a year he ordered all his host to
assemble fully equipped at the March parade, to have their arms inspected. After having passed in review all
the other warriors, he came to him who had struck the vase. "None," said he, "hath brought hither arms so ill
"Clovis at once sent a deputation to Gondebaud to ask Clotilde in marriage. Gondebaud, not daring to refuse,
put her into the hands of the envoys, who took her promptly to the king. Clovis at sight of her was transported
with joy, and married her." But to this short account other chroniclers, amongst them Fredegaire, who wrote a
commentary upon and a continuation of Gregory of Tours' work, added details which deserve reproduction,
first as a picture of manners, next for the better understanding of history. "As he was not allowed to see
Clotilde," says Fredegaire, "Clovis charged a certain Roman, named Aurelian, to use all his wit to come nigh
her. Aurelian repaired alone to the spot, clothed in rags and with his wallet upon his back, like a mendicant.
To insure confidence in himself he took with him the ring of Clovis. On his arrival at Geneva, Clotilde
received him as a pilgrim charitably, and, whilst she was washing his feet, Aurelian, bending towards her, said
under his breath, 'Lady, I have great matters to announce to thee if thou deign to permit me secret revelation.'
She consenting, replied, 'Say on.' 'Clovis, king of the Franks,' said he, 'hath sent me to thee: if it be the will of
God, he would fain raise thee to his high rank by marriage; and that thou mayest be certified thereof, he
sendeth thee this ring.' She accepted the ring with great joy, and said to Aurelian, 'Take for recompense of thy
pains these hundred sous in gold and this ring of mine. Return promptly to thy lord; if he would fain unite me
to him by marriage, let him send without delay messengers to demand me of my uncle Gondebaud, and let the
messengers who shall come take me away in haste, so soon as they shall have obtained permission; if they
haste not, I fear lest a certain sage, one Aridius, may return from Constantinople, and if he arrive beforehand,
all this matter will by his counsel come to nought.' Aurelian returned in the same disguise under which he had
come. On approaching the territory of Orleans, and at no great distance from his house, he had taken as
travelling companion a certain poor mendicant, by whom he, having fallen asleep from sheer fatigue, and
thinking himself safe, was robbed of his wallet and the hundred sous in gold that it contained. On awaking,
Aurelian was sorely vexed, ran swiftly home and sent his servants in all directions in search of the mendicant
who had stolen his wallet. He was found and brought to Aurelian, who, after drubbing him soundly for three
days, let him go his way. He afterwards told Clovis all that had passed and what Clotilde suggested. Clovis,
pleased with his success and with Clotilde's notion, at once sent a deputation to Gondebaud to demand his
niece in marriage. Gondebaud, not daring to refuse, and flattered at the idea of making a friend of Clovis,
promised to give her to him. Then the deputation, having offered the denier and the sou, according to the
custom of the Franks, espoused Clotilde in the name of Clovis, and demanded that she be given up to them to
be married. Without any delay the council was assembled at Chalons, and preparations made for the nuptials.
The Franks, having arrived with all speed, received her from the hands of Gondebaud, put her into a covered
carriage, and escorted her to Clovis, together with much treasure. She, however, having already learned that
Aridius was on his way back, said to the Frankish lords, "If ye would take me into the presence of your lord,
let me descend from this carriage, mount me on horseback, and get you hence as fast as ye may; for never in
this carriage shall I reach the presence of your lord."
"Aridius, in fact, returned very speedily from Marseilles, and Gondebaud, on seeing him, said to him, 'Thou
knowest that we have made friends with the Franks, and that I have given my niece to Clovis to wife.' 'This,'
answered Aridius, 'is no bond of friendship, but the beginning of perpetual strife; thou shouldst have
The majority of the learned have regarded this account of Fredegaire as a romantic fable, and have declined to
give it a place in history. M. Fauriel, one of the most learned associates of the Academy of Inscriptions, has
given much the same opinion, but he nevertheless adds, "Whatever may be their authorship, the fables in
question are historic in the sense that they relate to real facts of which they are a poetical expression, a
romantic development, conceived with the idea of popularizing the Frankish kings amongst the Gallo-Roman
subjects." It cannot, however, be admitted that a desire to popularize the Frankish kings is a sufficient and
truth-like explanation of these tales of the Gallo-Roman chroniclers, or that they are no more than "a poetical
expression," a romantic development of the real facts briefly noted by Gregory of Tours; the tales have a
graver origin and contain more truth than would be presumed from some of the anecdotes and sayings mixed
up with them. In the condition of minds and parties in Gaul at the end of the fifth century the marriage of
Clovis and Clotilde was, for the public of the period, for the barbarians and for the Gallo-Romans, a great
matter. Clovis and the Franks were still pagans; Gondebaud and the Burgundians were Christians, but Arians;
Clotilde was a Catholic Christian. To which of the two, Catholics or Arians, would Clovis ally himself? To
whom, Arian, pagan, or Catholic, would Clotilde be married? Assuredly the bishops, priests, and all the
Gallo-Roman clergy, for the most part Catholics, desired to see Clovis, that young and audacious Frankish
chieftain, take to wife a Catholic rather than an Arian or a pagan, and hoped to convert the pagan Clovis to
Christianity much more than an Arian to orthodoxy.
The question between Catholic orthodoxy and Arianism was, at that time, a vital question for Christianity in
its entirety, and St. Athanasius was not wrong in attributing to it supreme importance. It may be presumed that
the Catholic clergy, the bishop of Rheims, or the bishop of Langres, were no strangers to the repeated praises
which turned the thoughts of the Frankish king towards the Burgundian princess, and the idea of their
marriage once set afloat, the Catholics, priesthood or laity, labored undoubtedly to push it forward, whilst the
Burgundian Arians exerted themselves to prevent it. Thus there took place, between opposing influences,
religious and national, a most animated struggle. No astonishment can be felt, then, at the obstacles the
marriage encountered, at the complications mingled with it, and at the indirect means employed on both sides
to cause its success or failure. The account of Fredegaire is but a picture of this struggle and its incidents, a
little amplified or altered by imagination or the credulity of the period; but the essential features of the picture,
the disguise of Aurelian, the hurry of Clotilde, the prudent recollection of Aridius, Gondebaud's alternations
of fear and violence, and Clotilde's vindictive passion when she is once out of danger, there is nothing in all
this out of keeping with the manners of the time or the position of the actors. Let it be added that Aurelian and
Aridius are real personages who are met with elsewhere in history, and whose parts as played on the occasion
of Clotilde's marriage are in harmony with the other traces that remain of their lives.
On the return of Clovis, Clotilde, fearing he should forget his victory and his promise, "secretly sent," says
Gregory of Tours, "to St. Remi, bishop of Rheims, and prayed him to penetrate the king's heart, with the
words of salvation." St. Remi was a fervent Christian and an able bishop; and "I will listen to thee, most holy
father," said Clovis, "willingly; but there is a difficulty. The people that follow me will not give up their gods.
But I am about to assemble them, and will speak to them according to thy word." The king found the people
more docile or better prepared than he had represented to the bishop. Even before he opened his mouth the
greater part of those present cried out, "We abjure the mortal gods; we are ready to follow the immortal God
whom Remi preacheth." About three thousand Frankish warriors, however, persisted in their intention of
remaining pagans, and deserting Clovis, betook themselves to Ragnacaire, the Frankish king of Cambrai, who
was destined ere long to pay dearly for this acquisition. So soon as St. Remi was informed of this good
disposition on the part of king and people, he fixed Christmas Day of this year, 496, for the ceremony of the
baptism of these grand neophytes. The description of it is borrowed from the historian of the church of
Rheims, Frodoard by name, born at the close of the ninth century. He gathered together the essential points of
it from the Life of Saint Remi, written, shortly before that period, by the saint's celebrated successor at
Rheims, Archbishop Hincmar. "The bishop," says he, "went in search of the king at early morn in his
bed-chamber, in order that, taking him at the moment of freedom from secular cares, he might more freely
communicate to him the mysteries of the holy word. The king's chamber-people receive him with great
respect, and the king himself runs forward to meet him. Thereupon they pass together into an oratory
dedicated to St. Peter, chief of the apostles, and adjoining the king's apartment. When the bishop, the king,
and the queen had taken their places on the seats prepared for them, and admission had been given to some
clerics and also some friends and household servants of the king, the venerable bishop began his instructions
on the subject of salvation. . . . Meanwhile preparations are being made along the road from the palace to the
When it was known that Clovis had been baptized by St. Remi, and with what striking circumstance, great
was the satisfaction amongst the Catholics. The chief Burgundian prelate, Avitus, bishop of Vienne, wrote to
the Frankish king, "Your faith is our victory; in choosing for you and yours, you have pronounced for all;
divine providence bath given you as arbiter to our age. Greece can boast of having a sovereign of our
persuasion; but she is no longer alone in possession of this precious gift; the rest of the world cloth share her
light." Pope Anastasius hasted to express his joy to Clovis: "The Church, our common mother," he wrote,
"rejoiceth to have born unto God so great a king. Continue, glorious and illustrious son, to cheer the heart of
this tender mother; be a column of iron to support her, and she in her turn will give thee victory over all thine
enemies."
Clovis was not a man to omit turning his Catholic popularity to the account of his ambition. At the very time
when he was receiving these testimonies of good will from the heads of the Church, he learned that
Gondebaud, disquieted, no doubt, at the conversion of his powerful neighbor, had just made a vain attempt, at
a conference held at Lyons, to reconcile in his kingdom the Catholics and the Arians. Clovis considered the
moment favorable to his projects of aggrandizement at the expense of the Burgundian king; he fomented the
dissensions which already prevailed between Gondebaud and his brother Godegisile, assured to himself the
latter's complicity, and suddenly entered Burgundy with his army. Gondebaud, betrayed and beaten at the first
encounter at Dijon, fled to the south of his kingdom, and went and shut himself up in Avignon. Clovis
pursued and besieged him there. Gondebaud in great alarm asked counsel of his Roman confidant Aridius,
who had but lately foretold to him what the marriage of his niece Clotilde would bring upon him. "On every
side," said the king, "I am encompassed by perils, and I know not what to do; lo! here be these barbarians
come upon us to slay us and destroy the land." "To escape death," answered Aridius, "thou must appease the
ferocity of this man. Now, if it please thee, I will feign to fly from thee and go over to him. So soon as I shall
be with him, I will so do that he ruin neither thee nor the land. Only have thou care to perform whatsoever I
shall ask of thee, until the Lord in His goodness deign to make thy cause triumph." "All that thou shalt bid
will I do," said Gondebaud. So Aridius left Gondebaud and went his way to Clovis, and said, "Most pious
king, I am thy humble servant; I give up this wretched Gondebaud, and come unto thy mightiness. If thy
goodness deign to cast a glance upon me, thou and thy descendants will find in me a servant of integrity and
fidelity." Clovis received him very kindly and kept him by him, for Aridius was agreeable in conversation,
wise in counsel, just in judgment, and faithful in whatever was committed to his care. As the siege continued,
Aridius said to Clovis, "O king, if the glory of thy greatness would suffer thee to listen to the words of my
feebleness, though thou needest not counsel, I would submit them to thee in all fidelity, and they might be of
use to thee, whether for thyself or for the towns by the which thou dost propose to pass. Wherefore keepest
thou here thine army, whilst thine enemy doth hide himself in a well-fortified place? Thou ravagest the fields,
thou pillagest the corn, thou cuttest down the vines, thou fellest the olive trees, thou destroyest all the produce
of the land, and yet thou succeedest not in destroying thine adversary. Rather send thou unto him deputies,
and lay on him a tribute to be paid to thee every year. Thus the land will be preserved, and thou wilt be lord
forever over him who owes thee tribute. If he refuse, thou shalt then do what pleaseth thee." Clovis found the
counsel good, ordered his army to return home, sent deputies to Gondebaud, and called upon him to undertake
the payment every year of a fixed tribute. Gondebaud paid for the time, and promised to pay punctually for
the future. And peace appeared made between the two barbarians.
Beaten and kingless, the Goths retreated in great disorder; and Clovis, pursuing his march, arrived without
opposition at Bordeaux, where he settled down with his Franks for the winter. When the war season returned,
he marched on Toulouse, the capital of the Visigoths, which he likewise occupied without resistance, and
where he seized a portion of the treasure of the Visigothic kings. He quitted it to lay siege to Carcassonne,
which had been made by the Romans into the stronghold of Septimauia.
There his course of conquest was destined to end. After the battle of Vouille he had sent his eldest son
Theodoric in command of a division, with orders to cross Central Gaul from west to east, to go and join the
Burgundians of Gondebaud, who had promised his assistance, and in conjunction with them to attack the
Visigoths on the banks of the Rhone and in Narbonness. The young Frank boldly executed his father's orders,
but the intervention of Theodoric the Great, king of Italy, prevented the success of the operation. He sent an
army into Gaul to the aid of his son-in-law Alaric; and the united Franks and Burgundians failed in their
attacks upon the Visigoths of the Eastern Provinces. Clovis had no idea of compromising by his obstinacy the
conquests already accomplished; he therefore raised the siege of Carcassonne, returned first to Toulouse, and
then to Bordeaux, took Angouleme, the only town of importance he did not possess in Aquitania; and feeling
reasonably sure that the Visigoths, who, even with the aid that had cone from Italy, had great difficulty in
It appears that even the Britons of Armorica tendered to him at that time, through the interposition of
Melanins, bishop of Rennes, if not their actual submission, at any rate their subordination and homage.
Clovis at the same time had his self-respect flattered in a manner to which barbaric conquerors always attach
great importance. Anastasius, Emperor of the East, with whom he had already had some communication, sent
to him at Tours a solemn embassy, bringing him the titles and insignia of Patrician and Consul. "Clovis," says
Gregory of Tours, "put on the tunic of purple and the chlamys and the diadem; then mounting his horse, he
scattered with his own hand and with much bounty gold and silver amongst the people, on the road which lies
between the gate of the court belonging to the basilica of St. Martin and the church of the city. From that day
he was called Consul and Augustus. On leaving the city of Tours he repaired to Paris, where he fixed the seat
of his government."
Paris was certainly the political centre of his dominions, the intermediate point between the early settlements
of his race and himself in Gaul and his new Gallic conquests; but he lacked some of the possessions nearest to
him and most naturally, in his own opinion, his. To the east, north, and south-west of Paris were settled some
independent Frankish tribes, governed by chieftains with the name of kings. So soon as he had settled at Paris,
it was the one fixed idea of Clovis to reduce them all to subjection. He had conquered the Burgundians and
the Visigoths; it remained for him to conquer and unite together all the Franks. The barbarian showed himself
in his true colors, during this new enterprise, with his violence, his craft, his cruelty, and his perfidy. He began
with the most powerful of the tribes, the Ripuarian Franks. He sent secretly to Cloderic, son of Sigebert, their
king, saying, "Thy father hath become old, and his wound maketh him to limp o' one foot; if he should die, his
kingdom will come to thee of right, together with our friendship." Cloderic had his father assassinated whilst
asleep in his tent, and sent messengers to Clovis, saying, "My father is dead, and I have in my power his
kingdom and his treasures. Send thou unto me certain of thy people, and I will gladly give into their hands
whatsoever amongst these treasures shall seem like to please thee." The envoys of Clovis came, and, as they
were examining in detail the treasures of Sigebert, Cloderic said to them, "This is the coffer wherein my father
was wont to pile up his gold pieces." "Plunge," said they, "thy hand right to the bottom that none escape thee."
Cloderic bent forward, and one of the envoys lifted his battle-axe and cleft his skull. Clovis went to Cologne
and convoked the Franks of the canton. "Learn," said he, "that which hath happened. As I was sailing on the
river Scheldt, Cloderic, son of my relative, did vex his father, saying I was minded to slay him; and as
Sigebert was flying across the forest of Buchaw, his son himself sent bandits, who fell upon him and slew
him. Cloderic also is dead, smitten I know not by whom as he was opening his father's treasures. I am
altogether unconcerned in it all, and I could not shed the blood of my relatives, for it is a crime. But since it
hath so happened, I give unto you counsel, which ye shall follow if it seem to you good; turn ye towards me,
and live under my protection." And they who were present hoisted him on a huge buckler, and hailed him
king.
After Sigebert and the Ripuarian Franks, came the Franks of Terouanne, and Chararic their king. He had
refused, twenty years before, to march with Clovis against the Roman, Syagrius. Clovis, who had not
forgotten it, attacked him, took him and his son prisoners, and had them both shorn, ordering that Chararic
should be ordained priest and his son deacon. Chararic was much grieved. Then said his son to him, "Here be
branches which were cut from a green tree, and are not yet wholly dried up: soon they will sprout forth again.
May it please God that he who hath wrought all this shall die as quickly!" Clovis considered these words as a
menace, had both father and son beheaded, and took possession of their dominions. Ragnacaire, king of the
Franks of Cambrai, was the third to be attacked. He had served Clovis against Syagrins, but Clovis took no
account of that. Ragnacaire, being beaten, was preparing for flight, when he was seized by his own soldiers,
who tied his hands behind his back, and took him to Clovis along with his brother Riquier. "Wherefore hast
It is said that one day, after all these murders, Clovis, surrounded by his trusted servants, cried, "Woe is me!
who am left as a traveller amongst strangers, and who have no longer relatives to lend me support in the day
of adversity!" Thus do the most shameless take pleasure in exhibiting sham sorrow after crimes they cannot
disavow.
It cannot be known whether Clovis ever felt in his soul any scruple or regret for his many acts of ferocity and
perfidy, or if he looked, as sufficient expiation, upon the favor he had bestowed on the churches and their
bishops, upon the gifts he lavished on them, and upon the absolutions he demanded of them. In times of
mingled barbarism and faith there are strange cases of credulity in the way of bargains made with divine
justice. We read in the life of St. Eleutherus, bishop of Tournai, the native land of Clovis, that at one of those
periods when the conscience of the Frankish king must have been most heavily laden, he presented himself
one day at the church. "My lord king," said the bishop, "I know wherefore thou art come to me." "I have
nothing special to say unto thee," rejoined Clovis. "Say not so, O king," replied the bishop; "thou hast sinned,
and darest not avow it." The king was moved, and ended by confessing that he had deeply sinned and had
need of large pardon. St. Eleutherus betook himself to prayer; the king came back the next day, and the bishop
gave him a paper on which was written by a divine hand, he said, "The pardon granted to royal offences
which might not be revealed." Clovis accepted this absolution, and loaded the church of Tournai with his
gifts. In 511, the very year of his death, his last act in life was the convocation at Orleans of a Council, which
was attended by thirty bishops from the different parts of his kingdom, and at which were adopted thirty-one
canons that, whilst granting to the Church great privileges and means of influence, in many cases favorable to
humanity and respect for the rights of individuals, bound the Church closely to the State, and gave to royalty,
even in ecclesiastical matters, great power. The bishops, on breaking up, sent these canons to Clovis, praying
him to give them the sanction of his adhesion, which he did. A few months afterwards, on the 27th of
November, 511, Clovis died at Paris, and was buried in the church of St. Peter and St. Paul, nowadays St.
Genevieve, built by his wife Queen Clotilde, who survived him.
It was but right to make the reader intimately acquainted with that great barbarian who, with all his vices and
all his crimes, brought about, or rather began, two great matters which have already endured through fourteen
centuries, and still endure; for he founded the French monarchy and Christian France. Such men and such
facts have a right to be closely studied and set in a clear light by history. Nothing similar will be seen for two
centuries, under the descendants of Clovis, the Merovingians; amongst them will be encountered none but
those personages whom death reduces to insignificance, whatever may have been their rank in the world, and
of whom Virgil thus speaks to Dante:—
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MEROVINGIANS.
In its beginning and in its end the line of the Merovingians is mediocre and obscure. Its earliest ancestors,
Meroveus, from whom it got its name, and Clodion, the first, it is said, of the long-haired kings, a
characteristic title of the Frankish kings, are scarcely historical personages; and it is under the qualification of
sluggard kings that the last Merovingians have a place in history. Clovis alone, amidst his vices and his
crimes, was sufficiently great and did sufficiently great deeds to live forever in the course of ages; the greatest
part of his successors belong only to genealogy or chronology. In a moment of self-abandonment and
Southern Gaul, that is to say, Aquitania, Vasconia, Narbonness, called Septimania, and the two banks of the
Rhone near its mouths, were not comprised in these partitions of the Frankish dominions. Each of the
copartitioners assigned to themselves, to the south of the Garonne and on the coasts of the Mediterranean, in
that beautiful region of old Roman Gaul, such and such a district or such and such a town, just as heirs-at- law
keep to themselves severally such and such a piece of furniture or such and such a valuable jewel out of a rich
property to which they succeed, and which they divide amongst them. The peculiar situation of those
provinces at their distance from the Franks' own settlements contributed much towards the independence
which Southern Gaul, and especially Aquitania, was constantly striving and partly managed to recover, amidst
the extension and tempestuous fortunes of the Frankish monarchy. It is easy to comprehend how these
repeated partitions of a mighty inheritance with so many successors, these dominions continually changing
both their limits and their masters, must have tended to increase the already profound anarchy of Roman and
Barbaric worlds thrown pell-mell one upon the other, and fallen a prey, the Roman to the disorganization of a
lingering death, the barbaric to the fermentation of a new existence striving for development under social
conditions quite different from those of its primitive life. Some historians have said that, in spite of these
perpetual dismemberments of the great Frankish dominion, a real unity had always existed in the Frankish
monarchy, and regulated the destinies of its constituent peoples. They who say so show themselves singularly
The history of the most barbarous peoples and times assuredly offers no example, in one and the same family,
of an usurpation more perfidiously and atrociously consummated. King Clodomir, the father of the two young
Even in the coarsest and harshest ages the soul of man does not completely lose its instincts of justice and
humanity. The bishops and priests were not alone in crying out against such atrocities; the barbarians
themselves did not always remain indifferent spectators of them, but sometimes took advantage of them to
rouse the wrath and warlike ardor of their comrades. "About the year 528, Theodoric, king of Metz, the eldest
son of Clovis, purposed to undertake a grand campaign on the right bank of the Rhine against his neighbors
the Thuringians, and summoned the Franks to a meeting. 'Bethink you,' said he, that of old time the
Thuringians fell violently upon our ancestors, and did them much harm. Our fathers, ye know, gave them
hostages to obtain peace; but the Thuringians put to death those hostages in divers ways, and once more
falling upon our relatives, took from them all they possessed. After having hung children up, by the sinews of
their thighs, on the branches of trees, they put to a most cruel death more than two hundred young girls, tying
them by the legs to the necks of horses, which, driven by pointed goads in different directions, tore the poor
souls in pieces; they laid others along the ruts of the roads, fixed them in the earth with stakes, drove over
them laden cars, and so left them, with their bones all broken, as a meal for the birds and dogs. To this very
day doth Hermannfroi fail in his promise, and absolutely refuse to fulfil his engagements: right is on our side;
march we against them with the help of God.' Then the Franks, indignant at such atrocities, demanded with
one voice to be led into Thuringia. . . . Victory made them masters of it, and they reduced the country under
their dominion. . . . Whilst the Frankish kings were still there, Theodoric would have slain his brother
Clotaire. Having put armed men in waiting, he had him fetched to treat secretly of a certain matter. Then,
having arranged, in a portion of his house, a curtain from wall to wall, he posted his armed men behind it; but,
as the curtain was too short, it left their feet exposed. Clotaire, having been warned of the snare, entered the
house armed and with a goodly company. Theodoric then perceived that he was discovered, invented some
story, and talked of this, that, and the other. At last, not knowing how to get his treachery forgotten, he made
Clotaire a present of a large silvern dish. Clotaire wished him good by, thanked him, and returned home. But
Theodoric immediately complained to his own folks that he had sacrificed his silvern dish to no purpose, and
said to his son Theodebert, 'Go, find thy uncle, and pray him to give thee the present I made him.' Theodebert
went, and got what he asked. In such tricks did Theodoric excel." (Gregory of Tours, III. vii.)
These Merovingian kings were as greedy and licentious as they were cruel. Not only was pillage, in their
estimation, the end and object of war, but they pillaged even in the midst of peace and in their own
dominions; sometimes, after the Roman practice, by aggravation of taxes and fiscal manoeuvres, at others
after the barbaric fashion, by sudden attacks on places and persons they knew to be rich. It often happened
"Close upon this tyrannical magnificence came unexpected sorrows, and close upon these outrages remorse.
The youngest son of King Chilperic, Dagobert by name, fell ill. He was a little better, when his elder brother
Chlodebert was attacked with the same symptoms. His mother Fredegonde, seeing him in danger of death, and
touched by tardy repentance, said to the king, 'Long hath divine mercy borne with our misdeeds; it hath
warned us by fever, and other maladies, and we have not mended our ways, and now we are losing our sons;
now the tears of the poor, the lamentations of widows, and the sighs of orphans are causing them to perish,
and leaving us no hope of laying by for any one. We heap up riches and know not for whom. Our treasures, all
laden with plunder and curses, are like to remain without possessors. Our cellars are they not bursting with
wine, and our granaries with corn? Our coffers were they not full to the brim with gold and silver and precious
stones and necklaces and other imperial ornaments? And yet that which was our most beautiful possession we
are losing! Come then, if thou wilt, and let us burn all these wicked lists; let our treasury be content with what
was sufficient for thy father Clotaire.' Having thus spoken, and beating her breast, the queen had brought to
her the rolls, which Mark had consigned to her of each of the cities that belonged to her, and cast them into the
fire. Then, turning again to the king, 'What!' she cried, 'dost thou hesitate? Do thou even as I; if we lose our
dear children, at least escape we everlasting punishment.' Then the king, moved with compunction, threw into
the fire all the lists, and, when they were burned, sent people to stay the levy of those imposts. And afterwards
It is doubtful whether the maternal grief of Fredegonde were quite so pious and so strictly in accordance with
morality as it has been represented by Gregory of Tours; but she was, without doubt, passionately sincere.
Rash actions and violent passions are the characteristics of barbaric natures; the interest or impression of the
moment holds sway over them, and causes forgetfulness of every moral law as well as of every wise
calculation. These two characteristics show themselves in the extreme license displayed in the private life of
the Merovingian kings: on becoming Christians, not only did they not impose upon themselves any of the
Christian rules in respect of conjugal relations, but the greater number of them did not renounce polygamy,
and more than one holy bishop, at the very time that he reprobated it, was obliged to tolerate it. "King Clotaire
I. had to wife Ingonde, and her only did he love, when she made to him the following request: 'My lord,' said
she, 'hath made of his handmaid what seemed to him good; and now, to crown his favors, let my lord deign to
hear what his handmaid demandeth. I pray you be graciously pleased to find for my sister Aregonde, your
slave, a man both capable and rich, so that I be rather exalted than abased thereby, and be enabled to serve you
still more faithfully.' At these words Clotaire, who was but too voluptuously disposed by nature, conceived a
fancy for Aregonde, betook himself to the country-house where she dwelt, and united her to him in marriage.
When the union had taken place he returned to Ingonde, and said to her, 'I have labored to procure for thee the
favor thou didst so sweetly demand, and, on looking for a man of wealth and capability worthy to be united to
thy sister, I could find no better than myself; know, therefore, that I have taken her to wife, and I trow that it
will not displease thee.' What seemeth good in my master's eyes, that let him do,' replied Ingonde: 'only let thy
servant abide still in the king's grace.'"
Clotaire I. had, as has been already remarked, four sons: the eldest, Charibert, king of Paris, had to wife
Ingoberge, "who had in her service two young persons, daughters of a poor work-man; one of them, named
Marcovieve, had donned the religious dress, the other was called Meroflede, and the king loved both of them
exceedingly. They were daughters, as has been said, of a worker in wool. Ingoberge, jealous of the affection
borne to them by the king, had their father put to work inside the palace, hoping that the king, on seeing him
in such condition, would conceive a distaste for his daughters; and, whilst the man was at his work, she sent
for the king.
"Charibert, thinking he was going to see some novelty, saw only the workman afar off at work on his wool.
He forsook Ingoberge, and took to wife Meroflede. He had also (to wife) another young girl named
Theudoehilde, whose father was a shepherd, a mere tender of sheep, and had by her, it is said, a son who, on
issuing from his mother's womb, was carried straight-way to the grave." Charibert afterwards espoused
Marcovive, sister of Meroflede; and for that cause both were excommunicated by St. Germain, bishop of
Paris.
Chilperic, fourth son of Clotaire I. and king of Soissons, "though he had already several wives, asked the hand
of Galsuinthe, eldest daughter of Athanagild, king of Spain. She arrived at Soissons and was united to him in
marriage; and she received strong evidences of love, for she had brought with her vast treasures. But his love
for Fredegonde, one of the principal women about Chilperic, occasioned fierce disputes between them. As
Galsuinthe had to complain to the king of continual insult and of not sharing with him the dignity of his rank,
she asked him in return for the treasures which she had brought, and which she was ready to give up to him, to
send her back free to her own country. Chilperic, artfully dissimulating, appeased her with soothing words;
and then had her strangled by a slave, and she was found dead in her bed. When he had mourned for her
death, he espoused Fredegonde after an interval of a few days." (Gregory of Tours, IV. xxvi., xxviii.)
"Theodebert," says Gregory of Tours, "when confirmed in his kingdom, showed himself full of greatness and
goodness; he ruled with justice, honoring the bishops, doing good to the churches, helping the poor, and
distributing in many directions numerous benefits with a very charitable and very liberal hand. He generously
remitted to the churches of Auvergne all the tribute they were wont to pay into his treasury." (III. xxv.)
Gontran, king of Burgundy, in spite of many shocking and unprincipled deeds, at one time of violence, at
another of weakness, displayed, during his reign of thirty-three years, an inclination towards moderation and
peace, in striking contrast with the measureless pretensions and outrageous conduct of the other Frankish
kings his contemporaries, especially King Chilperic his brother. The treaty concluded by Gontran, on the 38th
of November, 587, at Andelot, near Langres, with his young nephew Childebert, king of Metz, and Queen
Brunehant, his mother, contains dispositions, or, more correctly speaking, words, which breathe a sincere but
timid desire to render justice to all, to put an end to the vindictive or retrospective quarrels and spoliations
which were incessantly harassing the Gallo-Frankish community, and to build up peace between the two kings
on the foundation of mutual respect for the rights of their lieges. "It is established," says this treaty, "that
whatsoever the kings have given to the churches or to their lieges, or with God's help shall hereafter will to
give to them lawfully, shall be irrevocable acquired; as also that none of the lieges, in one kingdom or the
other, shall have to suffer damage in respect of whatsoever belongeth to him, either by law or by virtue of a
decree, but shall be permitted to recover and possess things due to him. . . . And as the aforesaid kings have
allied themselves, in the name of God, by a pure and sincere affection, it hath been agreed that at no time shall
passage through one kingdom be refused to the Leudes (lieges—great vassals) of the other kingdom
who shall desire to traverse them on public or private affairs. It is likewise agreed that neither of the two kings
shall solicit the Leudes of the other or receive them if they offer themselves; and if, peradventure, any of these
Leudes shall think it necessary, in consequence of some fault, to take refuge with the other king, he shall be
absolved according to the nature of his fault and given back. It hath seemed good also to add to the present
treaty that whichever, if either, of the parties happen to violate it, under any pretext and at any time
whatsoever, it shall lose all advantages, present or prospective, therefrom; and they shall be for the profit of
that party which shall have faithfully observed the aforesaid conventions, and which shall be relieved in all
points from the obligations of its oath." (Gregory of Tours, IX. xx.)
It may be doubted whether between Gontran and Childebert the promises in the treaty were always
scrupulously fulfilled; but they have a stamp of serious and sincere intention foreign to the habitual relations
between the other Merovingian kings.
Mention was but just now made of two women—two queens—Fredegonde and Brunehaut, who,
at the Merovingian epoch, played important parts in the history of the country. They were of very different
origin and condition; and, after fortunes which were for a long while analogous, they ended very differently.
Fredegonde was the daughter of poor peasants in the neighborhood of Montdidier in Picardy, and at an early
age joined the train of Queen Audovere, the first wife of King Chilperic. She was beautiful, dexterous,
ambitious, and bold; and she attracted the attention, and before long awakened the passion of the king. She
pursued with ardor and without scruple her unexpected fortune. Queen Audovere was her first obstacle and
her first victim; and on the pretext of a spiritual relationship which rendered her marriage with Chilperic
Brunehaut had no occasion for crimes to become a queen, and, in spite of those she committed, and in spite of
her out-bursts and the moral irregularities of her long life, she bore, amidst her passion and her power, a stamp
of courageous frankness and intellectual greatness which places her far above the savage who was her rival.
Fredegonde was an upstart, of barbaric race and habits, a stranger to every idea and every design not
connected with her own personal interest and successes; and she was as brutally selfish in the case of her
natural passions as in the exercise of a power acquired and maintained by a mixture of artifice and violence.
Brunehaut was a princess of that race of Gothic kings who, in Southern Gaul and in Spain, had understood
and admired the Roman civilization, and had striven to transfer the remains of it to the newly-formed fabric of
their own dominions. She, transplanted to a home amongst the Franks of Austrasia, the least Roman of all the
barbarians, preserved there the ideas and tastes of the Visigoths of Spain, who had become almost
Gallo-Romans; she clung stoutly to the efficacious exercise of the royal authority; she took a practical interest
in the public works, highways, bridges, monuments, and the progress of material civilization; the Roman
roads in a short time received and for a long while kept in Anstrasia the name of Brunehaut's causeways; there
used to he shown, in a forest near Bourges, Brunehaut's castle, Brunehaut's tower at Etampes, Brunehaut's
After the execution of Brunehaut and the death of Clotaire II., the history of the Franks becomes a little less
dark and less bloody. Not that murders and great irregularities, in the court and amongst the people, disappear
altogether. Dagobert I., for instance, the successor of Clotaire II., and grandson of Chilperic and Fredegonde,
"In 555, Clotaire I. had made an expedition against the Saxons, who demanded peace; but the Frankish
warriors would not hear of it. 'Cease, I pray you,' said Clotaire to them, 'to be evil-minded against these men;
they speak us fair; let us not go and attack them, for fear we bring down upon us the anger of God.' But the
Franks would not listen to him. The Saxons again came with offerings of vestments, flocks, even all their
possessions, saying, 'Take all this, together with half our country; leave us but our wives and little children;
only let there be no war between us.' But the Franks again refused all terms. 'Hold, I adjure you,' said Clotaire
again to them; 'we have not right on our side; if ye be thoroughly minded to enter upon a war in which ye may
find your loss, as for me, I will not follow ye.' Then the Franks, enraged against Clotaire, threw themselves
upon him, tore his tent to pieces as they heaped reproaches upon him, and bore him away by force, determined
to kill him if he hesitated to march with them. So Clotaire, in spite of himself, departed with them. But when
they joined battle they were cut to pieces by their adversaries, and on both sides so many fell that it was
impossible to estimate or count the number of the dead. Then Clotaire with shame demanded peace of the
Saxons, saying that it was not of his own will that he had attacked them; and, having obtained it, returned to
his own dominions." (Gregory of Tours, III. xi., xii.; IV. xiv.)
King Dagobert was not thus under the yoke of his "leudes." Either by his own energy, or by surrounding
himself with wise and influential counsellors, such as Pepin of Landen, mayor of the palace of Austrasia, St.
Arnoul, bishop of Metz, St. Eligius, bishop of Noyon, and St. Andoenus, bishop of Rouen, he applied himself
to and succeeded in assuring to himself, in the exercise of his power, a pretty large measure of independence
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.THE MAYORS OF THE PALACE.THE PEPINS AND THE CHANGE OF DYNASTY. 109
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this imperative necessity. The last of the kings sprung from Clovis acquitted themselves too ill or not at all of
their task; and the mayors of the palace were naturally summoned to supply their deficiencies, and to give the
populations assurance of more intelligence and energy in the exercise of power. The origin and primitive
character of these supplements of royalty were different according to circumstances; at one time, conformably
with their title, the mayors of the palace really came into existence in the palace of the Frankish kings,
amongst the "leudes," charged, under the style of antrustions (lieges in the confidence of the king: in truste
regia), with the internal management of the royal affairs and household, or amongst the superior chiefs of the
army; at another, on the contrary, it was to resist the violence and usurpation of the kings that the "leudes,"
landholders or warriors, themselves chose a chief able to defend their interests and their rights against the
royal tyranny or incapacity. Thus we meet, at this time, with mayors of the palace of very different political
origin and intention, some appointed by the kings to support royalty against the "leudes," others chosen by the
"leudes" against the kings. It was especially between the Neustrian and Austrasian mayors of the palace that
this difference became striking. Gallo-Roman feeling was more prevalent in Neustria, Germanic in Austrasia.
The majority of the Neustrian mayors supported the interests of royalty, the Austrasian those of the
aristocracy of landholders and warriors. The last years of the Merovingian line were full of their struggles; but
a cause far more general and more powerful than these differences and conflicts in the very heart of the
Frankish dominions determined the definitive fall of that line and the accession of another dynasty. When in
687 the battle fought at Testry, on the banks of the Somme, left Pepin of Heristal, duke and mayor of the
palace of Austrasia, victorious over Bertaire, mayor of the palace of Neustria, it was a question of something
very different from mere rivalry between the two Frankish dominions and their chiefs.
At their entrance and settlement upon the left bank of the Rhine and in Gaul, the Franks had not abandoned
the right bank and Germany; there also they remained settled and incessantly at strife with their neighbors of
Germanic race, Thuringians, Bavarians, the confederation of Allemannians, Frisons, and Saxons, people
frequently vanquished and subdued to all appearance, but always ready to rise either for the recovery of their
independence, or, again, under the pressure of that grand movement which, in the third century, had
determined the general invasion by the barbarians of the Roman empire. After the defeat of the Huns at
Chalons, and the founding of the Visigothic, Burgundian, and Frankish kingdoms in Gaul, that movement had
been, if not arrested, at any rate modified, and for the moment suspended. In the sixth century it received a
fresh impulse; new nations, Avars, Tartars, Bulgarians, Slavons, and Lombards thrust one another with mutual
pressure from Asia into Europe, from Eastern Europe into Western; from the North to the South, into Italy and
into Gaul. Driven by the Ouigour Tartars from Pannonia and Noricum (nowadays Austria), the Lombards
threw themselves first upon Italy, crossed before long the Alps, and penetrated into Burgundy and Provence,
to the very gates of Avignon. On the Rhine and along the Jura the Franks had to struggle on their own account
against the new comers; and they were, further, summoned into Italy by the Emperors of the East, who wanted
their aid against the Lombards. Everywhere resistance to the invasion of barbarians became the national
attitude of the Franks, and they proudly proclaimed themselves the defenders of that West of which they had
but lately been the conquerors.
When the Merovingians were indisputably nothing but sluggard kings, and when Ebroin, the last great mayor
of the palace of Neustria, had been assassinated (in 681), and the army of the Neustrians destroyed at the
battle of Testry (in 687), the ascendency in the heart of the whole of Frankish Gaul passed to the Franks of
Austrasia, already bound by their geographical position to the defence of their nation in its new settlement.
There had risen up among them a family, powerful from its vast domains, from its military and political
services, and already also from the prestige belonging to the hereditary transmission of name and power. Its
first chief known in history had been Pepin of Landen, called The Ancient, one of the foes of Queen
Brunehaut, who was so hateful to the Austrasians, and afterwards one of the privy councillors and mayor of
the palace of Austrasia, under Dagobert I. and his son Sigebert II. He died in 639, leaving to his family an
influence already extensive. His son Grimoald succeeded him as mayor of the palace, ingloriously; but his
grandson, by his daughter Bega, Pepin of Heristal, was for twenty-seven years not only virtually, as mayor of
the palace, but ostensibly and with the title of duke, the real sovereign of Austrasia and all the Frankish
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dominion. He did not, however, take the name of king; and four descendants of Clovis, Thierry III., Clovis
III., Childebert III., and Dagobert III. continued to bear that title in Neustria and Burgundy, under the
preponderating influence of Pepin of Heristal. He did, during his long sway, three things of importance. He
struggled without cessation to keep or bring back under the rule of the Franks the Germanic nations on the
right bank of the Rhine,—Frisons, Saxons, Thuringians, Bavarians, and Allemannians; and thus to
make the Frankish dominion a bulwark against the new flood of barbarians who were pressing one another
westwards.
He rekindled in Austrasia the national spirit and some political life by beginning again the old March parades
of the Franks, which had fallen into desuetude under the last Merovingians. Lastly, and this was, perhaps, his
most original merit, he understood of what importance, for the Frankish kingdom, was the conversion to
Christianity of the Germanic peoples over the Rhine, and he abetted with all his might the zeal of the popes
and missionaries, Irish, Anglo-Saxon, and Gallo-Roman, devoted to this great work. The two apostles of
Friesland, St. Willfried and St. Willibrod, especially the latter, had intimate relations with Pepin of Heristal,
and received from him effectual support. More than twenty bishoprics, amongst others those of Utrecht,
Mayence, Ratisbonne, Worms, and Spire, were founded at this epoch; and one of those ardent pioneers of
Christian civilization, the Irish bishop, St. Lievin, martyred in 656 near Ghent, of which he has remained the
patron saint, wrote in verse to his friend Herbert, a little before his martyrdom, "I have seen a sun without
rays, days without light, and nights without repose. Around me rageth a people impious and clamorous for my
blood. O people, what harm have I done thee? 'Tis peace that I bring thee; wherefore declare war against me?
But thy barbarism will bring my triumph and give me the palm of martyrdom. I know in whom I trust, and my
hope shall not be confounded. Whilst I am pouring forth these verses, there cometh unto me the tired driver of
the ass that beareth me the usual provisions: he bringeth that which maketh the delights of the country, even
milk and butter and eggs; the cheeses stretch the wicker-work of the far too narrow panniers. Why tarriest
thou, good carrier? Quicken thy step; collect thy riches, thou that this morning art so poor. As for me I am no
longer what I was, and have lost the gift of joyous verse. How could it be other-wise when I am witness of
such cruelties?"
It were difficult to describe with more pious, graceful, and melancholy feeling a holier and a simpler life.
After so many firm and glorious acts of authority abroad, Pepin of Heristal at his death, December 16, 714,
did a deed of weakness at home. He had two wives, Plectrude and Alpaide; he had repudiated the former to
espouse the latter, and the church, considering the second marriage unlawful, had constantly urged him to take
back Plectrude. He had by her a son, Grimoald, who was assassinated on his way to join his father lying ill
near Liege. This son left a child, Theodoald, only six years old. This child it was whom Pepin, either from a
grandfather's blind fondness, or through the influence of his wife Plectrude, appointed to succeed him, to the
detriment of his two sons by Alpaide, Charles and Childebrand. Charles, at that time twenty-five years of age,
had already a name for capacity and valor. On the death of Pepin, his widow Plectrude lost no time in
arresting and imprisoning at Cologne this son of her rival Alpaide; but, some months afterwards, in 715, the
Austrasians, having risen against Plectrude, took Charles out of prison and set him at their head, proclaiming
him Duke of Austrasia. He was destined to become Charles Martel.
He first of all took care to extend and secure his own authority over all the Franks. At the death of Pepin of
Heristal, the Neustrians, vexed at the long domination of the Austrasians, had taken one of themselves,
Ragenfried, as mayor of the palace, and had placed at his side a Merovingian sluggard king, Chilperic II.,
whom they had dragged from a monastery. Charles, at the head of the Austrasians, twice succeeded in
beating, first near Cambrai and then near Soissons, the Neustrian king and mayor of the palace, pursued them
to Paris, returned to Cologne, got himself accepted by his old enemy Queen Plectrude, and remaining
temperate amidst the triumph of his ambition, he, too, took from amongst the surviving Merovingians a
sluggard king, whom he installed under the name of Clotaire IV., himself becoming, with the simple title of
Duke of Austrasia, master of the Frankish dominion.
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Being in tranquillity on the left bank of the Rhine, Charles directed towards the right bank—towards
the Frisons and the Saxons—his attention and his efforts. After having experienced, in a first encounter,
a somewhat severe check, he took, from 715 to 718, ample revenge upon them, repressed their attempts at
invasion of Frankish territory, and pursued them on their own, imposed tribute upon them, and commenced
with vigor, against the Saxons in particular, that struggle, at first defensive and afterwards aggressive, which
was to hold so prominent a place in the life and glorious but blood-stained annals of his grandson
Charlemagne.
In the war against the Neustrians, at the battle of Soissons in 719, Charles had encountered in their ranks
Eudes or Eudon, Duke of Aquitania and Vasconia, that beautiful portion of Southern Gaul situated between
the Pyrenees, the Ocean, the Garonne, and the Rhone, who had been for a long time trying to shake off the
dominion of the barbarians, Visigoths or Franks. At the death of Pepin of Heristal, the Neustrians had drawn
into alliance with them, for their war against the Austrasians, this Duke Elides, to whom they gave, as it
appears, the title of king. After their common defeat at Soissons, the Aquitanian prince withdrew precipitately
into his own country, taking with him the sluggard king of the Neustrians, Chilperic II. Charles pursued him
to the Loire, and sent word to him, a few months afterwards, that he would enter into friendship with him if he
would deliver up Chilperic and his treasures; otherwise he would invade and ravage Aquitania. Eudes
delivered up Chilperic and his treasures; and Charles, satisfied with having in his power this Merovingian
phantom, treated him generously, kept up his royal rank, and at his death, which happened soon afterwards,
replaced him by another phantom of the same line, Theodoric or Thierry IV.; whom he dragged from the
abbey of Chelles, founded by Queen St. Bathilde, wife of Clovis II., and who for seventeen years bore the title
of king, whilst Charles Martel was ruling gloriously, and was, perhaps, the savior of the Frankish dominions.
When he contracted his alliance with the Duke of Aquitania, Charles Martel did not know against what
enemies and perils he would soon have to struggle.
In the earlier years of the eighth century, less than a hundred years from the death of Mahomet, the
Mussulman Arabs, after having conquered Syria, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Northern Africa, had passed into
Europe, invaded Spain, overthrown the kingdom of the Visigoths, driven back the remnants of the nation and
their chief, Pelagius, to the north of the Peninsula, into the Asturias and Galicia, and pushed even beyond the
Pyrenees, into old Narbonness, then called Septimania, their limitless incursions. These fiery conquerors did
not amount at that time, according to the most probable estimates, to more than fifty thousand; but they were
under the influence of religious and warlike enthusiasm at one and the same time; they were fanatics in the
cause of Deism and of glory. "The Arab warrior during campaigns was not excused from any one of the
essential duties of Islamism; he was bound to pray at least once a day, on rising in the morning, at the blush of
dawn. The general of the army was its priest; he it was who, at the head of the ranks, gave the signal for
prayer, uttered the words, reminded the troops of the precepts of the Koran, and enjoined upon them
forgetfulness of personal quarrels." One day, on the point of engaging in a decisive battle, Moussaben-
Nossair, first governor of Mussulman Africa, was praying, according to usage, at the head of the troops; and
he omitted the invocation of the name of the Khalif, a respectful formality indispensable on the occasion. One
of his officers, persuaded that it was a mere slip on Moussa's part, made a point of admonishing him. "Know
thou," said Moussa, "that we are in such a position and at such an hour that no other name must be invoked
save that of the most high God." Moussa was, apparently, the first Arab chief to cross the Pyrenees and march,
plundering as he went, into Narbonness. The Arabs had but very confused ideas of Gaul; they called it
Frandjas, and gave to all its inhabitants, without distinction, the name of Frandj. The Khalif Abdelmelek,
having recalled Moussa, questioned him about the different peoples with which he had been concerned. "And
of these Frandj," said he, "what hast thou to tell me?" "They are a people," answered Moussa, "very many in
number and abundantly provided with everything, brave and impetuous in attack, but spiritless and timid
under reverses." "And how went the war betwixt them and thee?" added Abdelmelek: "was it favorable to thee
or the contrary?" "The contrary! Nay, by Allah and the Prophet; never was my army vanquished; never was a
battalion beaten; and never did the Mussulmans hesitate to follow me when I led them forty against
fourscore." (Fauriel, Histoire de la Gaule, &c., t. III., pp. 48, 67.)
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In 719, under El-Idaur-ben-Abdel-Rhaman, a valiant and able leader, say the Arab writers, but greedy, harsh,
and cruel, the Arabs pursued their incursions into Southern Gaul, took Narbonne, dispersed the inhabitants,
spread themselves abroad in search of plunder as far as the borders of the Garonne, and went and laid siege to
Toulouse. Eudes, Duke of Aquitania, happened to be at Bordeaux, and he hastily summoned all the forces of
his towns and all the populations from the Pyrenees to the Loire, and hurried to the relief of his capital. The
Arabs, commanded by a new chieftain, El-Samah, more popular amongst them than El-Haur, awaited him
beneath the walls of the city determined to give him battle. "Have ye no fear of this multitude," said El-Samah
to his warriors; "if God be with us, who shall be against us? "Elides had taken equally great pains to kindle the
pious courage of the Aquitanians; he spread amongst his troops a rumor that he had but lately received as a
present from Pope Gregory II. three sponges that had served to wipe down the table at which the sovereign
pontiffs were accustomed to celebrate the communion; he had them cut into little strips which he had
distributed to all those of the combatants who wished for them, and thereupon gave the sword to sound the
charge. The victory of the Aquitanians was complete; the Arab army was cut in pieces; El-Samah was slain,
and with him, according to the victors' accounts, full three hundred and seventy-five thousand of his troops.
The most truth-like testimonies and calculations do not put down at more than from fifty to seventy thousand
men, in fighting trim, the number of Arabs that entered Spain eight or ten years previously, even with the
additions it must have received by means of the emigrations from Africa; and undoubtedly El-Samah could
not have led into Aquitania more than from forty to forty-five thousand. However that may be, the defeat of
the Arabs before Toulouse was so serious that, four or five centuries afterwards, Ibn-Hayan, the best of their
historians, still spoke of it as the object of solemn commemoration, and affirmed that the Arab army had
entirely perished there, without the escape of a single man. The spot in the Roman road, between Carcassonne
and Toulouse, where the battle was fought, was one heap of dead bodies, and continued to be mentioned in the
Arab chronicles under the name of Martyrs' Causeway. But the Arabs of Spain were then in that unstable
social condition and in that heyday of impulsive youthfulness as a people, when men are more apt to be
excited and attracted by the prospect of bold adventures than discouraged by reverses. El-Samah, on crossing
the Pyrenees to go plundering and conquering in the country of the Frandj, had left as his lieutenant in the
Iberian peninsula Anbessa-ben-Sohim, one of the most able, most pious, most just, and most humane
chieftains, say the Arab chronicles, that Islamism ever produced in Europe. He, being informed of El-Samah's
death before Toulouse, resolved to resume his enterprise and avenge his defeat. In 725, he entered Gaul with a
strong army; took Carcassonne; reduced, either by force or by treaty, the principal towns of Septimania to
submission; and even carried the Arab arms, for the first time, beyond the Rhone into Provence. At the news
of this fresh invasion Duke Eudes hurried from Aquitania, collecting on his march the forces of the country,
and, after having waited some time for a favorable opportunity, gave the Arabs battle in Provence. It was
indecisive at first, but ultimately won by the Christians without other result than the retreat of Anbessa,
mortally wounded, upon the right bank of the Rhone, where he died without having been able himself to
recross the Pyrenees, but leaving the Arabs masters of Septimania, where they established themselves in force,
taking Narbonne for capital and a starting-point for their future enterprises.
The struggle had now begun in earnest, from the Rhone to the Garonne and the Ocean, between the Christians
of Southern Gaul and the Mussulmans of Spain. Duke Eudes saw with profound anxiety his enemies settled in
Septimania, and ever on the point of invading and devastating Aquitania. He had been informed that the
Khalif Hashem had just appointed to the governor-generalship of Spain Abdel-Rhaman (the Abderame of the
Christian chronicles), regarded as the most valiant of the Spanish Arabs, and that this chieftain was making
great preparations for resuming their course of invasion. Another peril at the same time pressed heavily on
Duke Eudes: his northern neighbor, Charles, sovereign duke of the Franks, the conqueror, beyond the Rhine,
of the Frisons and Saxons, was directing glances full of regret towards those beautiful countries of Southern
Gaul, which in former days Clovis had won from the Visigoths, and which had been separated, little by little,
from the Frankish empire. Either justly or by way of ruse Charles accused Duke Eudes of not faithfully
observing the treaty of peace they had concluded in 720; and on this pretext he crossed the Loire, and twice in
the same year, 731, carried fear and rapine into the possession of the Duke of Aquitania on the left bank of
that river. Eudes went, not unsuccessfully, to the rescue of his domains; but he was soon recalled to the
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Pyrenees by the news he received of the movements of Abdel-Rhaman and by the hope he had conceived of
finding, in Spain itself and under the sway of the Arabs, an ally against their invasion of his dominions. The
military command of the Spanish frontier of the Pyrenees and of the Mussulman forces there encamped had
been intrusted to Othman-ben-Abi-Nessa, a chieftain of renown, but no Arab, either in origin or at heart,
although a Mussulman. He belonged to the race of Berbers, whom the Romans called Moors, a people of the
north-west of Africa, conquered and subjugated by the Arabs, but impatient under the yoke. The greater part
of Abi- Nessa's troops were likewise Berbers and devoted to their chiefs. Abi- Nessa, ambitious and
audacious, conceived the project of seizing the government of the Peninsula, or at the least of making himself
independent master of the districts he governed; and he entered into negotiations with the Duke of Aquitania
to secure his support. In spite of religious differences their interests were too similar not to make an
understanding easy; and the secret alliance was soon concluded and confirmed by a precious pledge. Duke
Eudes had a daughter of rare beauty, named Lampagie, and he gave her in marriage to Abi-Nessa, who, say
the chronicles, became desperately enamoured of her.
But whilst Eudes, trusting to this alliance, was putting himself in motion towards the Loire to protect his
possessions against a fresh attack from the Duke of the Franks, the governor-general of Spain, Abdel-
Rhaman, informed of Abi-Nessa's plot, was arriving with large forces at the foot of the Pyrenees, to stamp out
the rebellion. Its repression was easy. "At the approach of Abdel-Rhaman," say the chroniclers, "Abi-Nessa
hastened to shut himself up in Livia [the ancient capital of Cerdagne, on the ruins of which Puycerda was
built], flattering himself that he could sustain a siege and there await succor from his father-in-law, Eudes; but
the advance-guard of Abdel-Rhaman followed him so closely and with such ardor that it left him no leisure to
make the least preparation for defence. Abi-Nessa, had scarcely time to fly from the town and gain the
neighboring mountains with a few servants and his well-beloved Lampagie. Already he had penetrated into an
out-of-the-way and lonely pass, where it seemed to him he ran no more risk of being discovered. He halted,
therefore, to rest himself and quench the thirst which was tormenting his lovely companion and himself,
beside a waterfall which gushed from a mass of lofty rocks upon a piece of fresh, green turf. They were
surrendering themselves to the delightful feeling of being saved, when, all at once, they hear a loud sound of
steps and voices; they listen; they glance in the direction of the sound, and perceive a detachment of armed
men, one of those that were out in search of them. The servants take to flight; but Lampagie, too weary,
cannot follow them, nor can Abi-Nessa abandon Lampagie. In the twinkling of an eye they are surrounded by
foes. The chronicler Isidore of Bdja says that Abi-Nessa, in order not to fall alive into their hands, flung
himself from top to bottom of the rocks; and an Arab historian relates that he took sword in hand, and fell
pierced with twenty lance-thrusts whilst fighting in defence of her he loved. They cut off his head, which was
forthwith carried to Abdel- Rhaman, to whom they led away prisoner the hapless daughter of Eudes. She was
so lovely in the eyes of Abdel-Rhaman, that he thought it his duty to send her to Damascus, to the commander
of the faithful, esteeming no other mortal worthy of her." (Fauriel, Historie de la Gaulle, &c., t. III., p. 115.)
Abdel-Rhaman, at ease touching the interior of Spain, reassembled the forces he had prepared for his
expedition, marched towards the Pyrenees by Pampeluna, crossed the summit become so famous under the
name of Port de Roncevaux, and debouched by a single defile and in a single column, say the chroniclers,
upon Gallic Vasconia, greater in extent than French Biscay now is. M. Fauriel, after scrupulous examination,
according to his custom, estimates the army of Abdel-Rhaman, whether Mussulman adventurers flocking
from all parts, or Arabs of Spain, at from sixty-five to seventy thousand fighting men. Duke Eudes made a
gallant effort to stop his march and hurl him back towards the mountains; but exhausted, even by certain small
successes, and always forced to retire, fight after fight, up to the approaches to Bordeaux, he crossed the
Garonne, and halted on the right bank of the river, to cover the city. Abdel-Rhaman who had followed him
closely, forced the passage of the river, and a battle was fought, in which the Aquitanians were defeated with
immense loss. "God alone," says Isidore of Beja, "knows the number of those who fell." The battle gained,
Abdel-Rhaman took Bordeaux by assault and delivered it over to his army. The plunder, to believe the
historians of the conquerors, surpassed all that had been preconceived of the wealth of the vanquished: "The
most insignificant soldier," say they, "had for his share plenty of topazes, jacinths, and emeralds, to say
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nothing of gold, a somewhat vulgar article under the circumstances." What appears certain is that, at their
departure from Bordeaux, the Arabs were so laden with booty that their march became less rapid and
unimpeded than before.
In the face of this disaster, the Franks and their duke were evidently the only support to which Eudes could
have recourse; and he repaired in all haste to Charles and invoked his aid against the common enemy, who,
after having crushed the Aquitanians, would soon attack the Franks, and subject them in turn to ravages and
outrages. Charles did not require solicitation. He took an oath of the Duke of Aquitania to acknowledge his
sovereignty and thenceforth remain faithful to him; and then, summoning all his warriors, Franks,
Burgundians, Gallo-Romans, and Germans from beyond the Rhine, he set himself in motion towards the
Loire. It was time. The Arabs had spread over the whole country between the Garonne and the Loire; they had
even crossed the latter river and penetrated into Burgundy as far as Autun and Sens, ravaging the country, the
towns, and the monasteries, and massacring or dispersing the populations. Abdel-Rhaman had heard tell of the
city of Tours and its rich abbey, the treasures whereof, it was said, surpassed those of any other city and any
other abbey in Gaul. Burning to possess it, he recalled towards this point his scattered forces. On arriving at
Poitiers he found the gates closed and the inhabitants resolved to defend themselves; and, after a fruitless
attempt at assault, he continued his march towards Tours. He was already beneath the walls of the place when
he learned that the Franks were rapidly advancing in vast numbers. He fell back towards Poitiers, collecting
the troops that were returning to him from all quarters, embarrassed with the immense booty they were
dragging in their wake. He had for a moment, say the historians, an idea of ordering his soldiers to leave or
burn their booty, to keep nothing but their arms, and think of nothing but battle: however, he did nothing of
the kind, and, to await the Franks, he fixed his camp between the Vienne and the Clain, near Poitiers, not far
from the spot where, two hundred and twenty-five years before, Clovis had beaten the Visigoths; or,
according to others, nearer Tours, at Mire, in a plain still called the Landes de Charlemagne.
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The Franks arrived. It was in the month of September or October, 732: and the two armies passed a week face
to face, at one time remaining in their camps, at another deploying without attacking. It is quite certain that
neither Franks nor Arabs, neither Charles nor Abdel-Rhaman themselves, took any such account, as we do in
our day, of the importance of the struggle in which they were on the point of engaging; it was a struggle
between East and West, South and North, Asia and Europe, the Gospel and the Koran; and we now say, on a
general consideration of events, peoples, and ages, that the civilization of the world depended upon it. The
generations that are passing upon earth see not so far, nor from such a height, the chances and consequences
of their acts; the Franks and Arabs, leaders and followers, did not regard themselves, now nearly twelve
centuries ago, as called upon to decide, near Poitiers, such future question; but vaguely, instinctively they felt
the grandeur of the part they were playing, and they mutually scanned one another with that grave curiosity
which precedes a formidable encounter between valiant warriors. At length, at the breaking of the seventh or
eighth day, Abdel-Rhaman, at the head of his cavalry, ordered a general attack; and the Franks received it
with serried ranks, astounding their enemies by their tall stature, stout armor, and their stern immobility.
"They stood there," says Isidore of Beja, "like solid walls or icebergs." During the fight, a body of Franks
penetrated into the enemy's camp, either for pillage or to take the Arabs in the rear. The horsemen of
Abdel-Rhaman at once left the general attack, and turned back to defend their camp or the booty deposited
there. Disorder set in amongst them, and, before long, throughout their whole army; and the battle became a
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confused melley, wherein the lofty stature and stout armor of the Franks had the advantage. A great number of
Arabs and Abdel-Rhaman himself were slain. At the approach of night both armies retired to their camps. The
next day, at dawn, the Franks moved out of theirs, to renew the engagement. In front of them was no stir, no
noise, no Arabs out of their tents and reassembling in their ranks. Some Franks were sent to reconnoitre,
entered the enemy's camp, and penetrated into their tents; but they were deserted. "The Arabs had decamped
silently in the night, leaving the bulk of their booty, and by this precipitate retreat acknowledging a more
severe defeat than they had really sustained in the fight."
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Foreseeing the effect which would be produced by their reverse in the country they had but lately traversed as
conquerors, they halted nowhere, but hastened to reenter Septimania and their stronghold Narbonne, where
they might await reenforcements from Spain. Duke Eudes, on his side, after having, as vassal, taken the oath
of allegiance to Charles, who will be henceforth called Charles Martel (Hammer), that glorious name which
he won by the great blow he dealt the Arabs, reentered his dominions of Aquitania and Vasconia, and applied
himself to the reestablishment there of security and of his own power. As for Charles Martel, indefatigable
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alike after and before victory, he did not consider his work in Southern Gaul as accomplished. He wished to
recover and reconstitute in its entirety the Frankish dominion; and he at once proceeded to reunite to it
Provence and the portions of the old kingdom of Burgundy situated between the Alps and the Rhone, starting
from Lyons. His first campaign with this object, in 733, was successful; he retook Lyons, Vienne, and
Valence, without any stoppage up to the Durance, and charged chosen "leudes" to govern these provinces with
a view especially to the repression of attempts at independence at home and incursions on the part of the
Arabs abroad. And it was not long before these two perils showed head. The government of Charles Martel's
"leudes" was hard to bear for populations accustomed for some time past to have their own way, and for their
local chieftains thus stripped of their influence. Maurontius, patrician of Arles, was the most powerful and
daring of these chieftains; and he had at heart the independence of his country and his own power far more
than Frankish grandeur. Caring little, no doubt, for the interests of religion, he entered into negotiations with
Youssouf- ben-Abdel-Rhaman, governor of Narbonne, and summoned the Mussulmans into Provence.
Youssouf lost no time in responding to the summons; and, from 734 to 736, the Arabs conquered and were in
military occupation of the left bank of the Rhone from Arles to Lyons. But in 737 Charles Martel returned,
reentered Lyons and Avignon, and, crossing the Rhone, marched rapidly on Narbonne, to drive the Arabs
from Septimania. He succeeded in beating them within sight of their capital; but, after a few attempts at
assault, not being able to become master of it, he returned to Provence, laying waste on his march several
towns of Septimania, Agde, Maguelonne, and Nimes, where he tried, but in vain, to destroy the famous
Roman arenas by fire, as one blows up an enemy's fortress. A rising of the Saxons recalled him to Northern
Gaul; and scarcely had he set out from Provence, when national insurrection and Arab invasion recommenced.
Charles Martel waited patiently as long as the Saxons resisted; but as soon as he was at liberty on their score,
in 739, he collected a strong army, made a third campaign along the Rhone, retook Avignon, crossed the
Durance, pushed on as far as the sea, took Marseilles, and then Arles, and drove the Arabs definitively from
Provence. Some Mussulman bands attempted to establish themselves about St. Tropez, on the rugged heights
and among the forests of the Alps; but Charles Martel carried his pursuit even into those wild retreats, and all
Southern Gaul, on the left bank of the Rhone, was incorporated in the Frankish dominion, which will be
henceforth called France.
The ordinary revenues of Charles Martel clearly could not suffice for so many expeditions and wars. He was
obliged to attract or retain by rich presents, particularly by gifts of lands, the warriors, old and new "leudes,"
who formed his strength. He therefore laid hands on a great number of the domains of the Church, and gave
them, with the title of benefices, in temporary holding, often converted into proprietorship, and under the style
of precarious tenure, to the chiefs in his service. There was nothing new in this: the Merovingian kings and the
mayors of the palace had more than once thus made free with ecclesiastical property; but Charles Martel
carried this practice much farther than his predecessors had. He did more: he sometimes gave his warriors
ecclesiastical offices and dignities. His liege Milo received from him the archbishoprics of Rheims and
Troves; and his nephew Hugh those of Paris, Rouen, and Bayeux, with the abbeys of Fontenelle and
Jumieges. The Church protested with all her might against such violations of her mission and her interest, her
duties and her rights. She was so specially set against Charles Martel that, more than a century after his death,
in 858, the bishops of France, addressing themselves to Louis the Germanic on this subject, wrote to him, "St.
Eucherius, bishop of Orleans, who now reposeth in the monastery of St. Trudon, being at prayer, was
transported into the realms of eternity; and there, amongst other things which the Lord did show unto him, he
saw Prince Charles delivered over to the torments of the damned in the lowest regions of hell. And St.
Eucherius demanding of the angel, his guide, what was the reason thereof, the angel answered that it was by
sentence of the saints whom he had robbed of their possessions, and who, at the day of the last judgment, will
sit with God to judge the world."
Whilst thus making use, at the expense of the Church, and for political interests, of material force, Charles
Martel was far from misunderstanding her moral influence and the need he had of her support at the very time
when he was incurring her anathemas. Not content with defending Christianity against Islamism, he aided it
against Paganism by lending the Christian missionaries in Germany and the north-west of Europe, amongst
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others St. Willibrod and St. Boniface, the most effectual assistance. In 724, he addressed to all religious and
political authorities that could be reached by his influence, not only to the bishops, "but to the dukes, counts,
their vicars, our palatines, all our agents, our envoys, and our friends this circular letter: 'Know that a
successor of the Apostles, our father in Christ, Boniface, bishop, hath come unto us saying that we ought to
take him under our safeguard and protection. We do you to wit that we do so very willingly. Wherefore we
have thought proper to give him confirmation thereof under our own hand, in order that, whithersoever he
may go, he may there be in peace and safety in the name of our affection and under our safeguard; in such sort
that he may be able everywhere to render, do, and receive justice. And if he come to find himself in any pass
or necessity which cannot be determined by law, that he may remain in peace and safety until he be come into
our presence, he and all who shall have hope in him or dependence on him. That none may dare to be
contrary-minded towards him or do him damage; and that he may rest at all times in tranquillity and safety
under our safeguard and protection. And in order that this may be regarded as certified, we have subscribed
these letters with our own hand and sealed them with our ring.'"
Here were clearly no vague and meaningless words, written to satisfy solicitation, and without a thought of
their consequences: they were urgent recommendations and precise injunctions, the most proper for securing
success to the protected in the name of the protector. Accordingly St. Boniface wrote, soon after, from the
heart of Germany, "Without the patronage of the prince of the Franks, without his order and the fear of his
power, I could not guide the people, or defend the priests, deacons, monks, or handmaids of God, or forbid in
this country the rites of the Pagans and their sacrilegious worship of idols."
At the same time that he protected the Christian missionaries launched into the midst of Pagan Germany,
Charles Martel showed himself equally ready to protect, but with as much prudence as good-will, the head of
the Christian Church. In 741, Pope Gregory III. sent to him two nuncios, the first that ever entered France in
such a character, to demand of him succor against the Lombards, the Pope's neighbors, who were threatening
to besiege Rome. These envoys took Charles Martel "so many presents that none had ever seen or heard tell of
the like," and amongst them the keys of St. Peter's tomb, with a letter in which the Pope conjured Charles
Martel not to attach any credit to the representations or words of Luitprandt, king of the Lombards, and to
lend the Roman Church that effectual support which, for some time past, she had been vainly expecting from
the Franks and their chief. "Let them come, we are told," wrote the Pope, piteously, "this Charles with whom
ye have sought refuge, and the armies of the Franks; let them sustain ye, if they can, and wrest ye from our
hands." Charles Martel was in fact on good terms with Luitprandt, who had come to his aid in his expeditions
against the Arabs in Provence. He, however, received the Pope's nuncios with lively satisfaction and the most
striking proofs of respect; and he promised them, not to make war on the Lombards, but to employ his
influence with King Luitprandt to make him cease from threatening Rome. He sent, in his turn, to the Pope
two envoys of distinction, Sigebert, abbot of St. Denis, and Grimon, abbot of Corbie, with instructions to offer
him rich presents and to really exert themselves with the king of the Lombards to remove the dangers dreaded
by the Holy See. He wished to do something in favor of the Papacy to show sincere good-will, without
making his relations with useful allies subordinate to the desires of the Pope.
Charles Martel had not time to carry out effectually with respect to the Papacy this policy of protection and at
the same time of independence; he died at the close of this same year, October 22, 741, at Kiersy-sur-Oise,
aged fifty-two years, and his last act was the least wise of his life. He had spent it entirely in two great works,
the reestablishment throughout the whole of Gaul of the Franco-Gallo-Roman empire, and the driving back
from the frontiers of this empire, of the Germans in the north and the Arabs in the south. The consequence, as
also the condition, of this double success was the victory of Christianity over Paganism and Islamism. Charles
Martel endangered these results by falling back into the groove of those Merovingian kings whose shadow he
had allowed to remain on the throne. He divided between his two legitimate sons, Pepin, called the Short,
from his small stature, and Carloman, this sole dominion which he had with so much toil reconstituted and
defended. Pepin had Neustria, Burgundy, Provence, and the suzerainty of Aquitaine; Carloman, Austrasia,
Thuringia, and Allemannia. They both, at their father's death, took only the title of mayor of the palace, and,
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perhaps, of duke. The last but one of the Merovingians, Thierry IV., had died in 737. For four years there had
been no king at all.
But when the works of men are wise and true, that is, in conformity with the lasting wants of peoples, and the
natural tendency of social facts, they get over even the mistakes of their authors. Immediately after the death
of Charles Martel, the consequences of dividing his empire became manifest. In the north, the Saxons, the
Bavarians, and the Allemannians renewed their insurrections. In the south, the Arabs of Septimania recovered
their hopes of effecting an invasion; and Hunald, Duke of Aquitaine, who had succeeded his father Eudes,
after his death in 735, made a fresh attempt to break away from Frankish sovereignty and win his
independence. Charles Martel had left a young son, Grippo, whose legitimacy had been disputed, but who was
not slow to set up pretensions and to commence intriguing against his brothers. Everywhere there burst out
that reactionary movement which arises against grand and difficult works when the strong hand that
undertook them is no longer by to maintain them; but this movement was of short duration and to little
purpose. Brought up in the school and in the fear of their father, his two sons, Pepin and Carloman, were
inoculated with his ideas and example; they remained united in spite of the division of dominions, and labored
together, successfully, to keep down, in the north the Saxons and Bavarians, in the south the Arabs and
Aquitanians, supplying want of unity by union, and pursuing with one accord the constant aim of Charles
Martel—abroad the security and grandeur of the Frankish dominion, at home the cohesion of all its
parts and the efficacy of its government. Events came to the aid of this wise conduct. Five years after the
death of Charles Martel, in 746 in fact, Carloman, already weary of the burden of power, and seized with a fit
of religious zeal, abdicated his share of sovereignty, left his dominions to his brother Pepin, had himself shorn
by the hands of Pope Zachary, and withdrew into Italy to the monastery of Monte Cassino. The preceding
year, in 745, Hunald, Duke of Aquitaine, with more patriotic and equally pious views, also abdicated in favor
of his son Waifre, whom he thought more capable than himself of winning the independence of Aquitaine,
and went and shut himself up in a monastery in the island of Rhe, where was the tomb of his father Eudes. In
the course of divers attempts at conspiracy and insurrection, the Frankish princes' young brother, Grippo, was
killed in combat whilst crossing the Alps. The furious internal dissensions amongst the Arabs of Spain and
their incessant wars with the Berbers did not allow them to pursue any great enterprise in Gaul. Thanks to all
these circumstances, Pepin found himself, in 747, sole master of the heritage of Clovis and with the sole
charge of pursuing, in State and Church, his father's work, which was the unity and grandeur of Christian
France.
Pepin, less enterprising than his father, but judicious, persevering, and capable of discerning what was at the
same time necessary and possible, was well fitted to continue and consolidate what he would, probably, never
have begun and created.
Like his father, he, on arriving at power, showed pretensions to moderation, or, it might be said, modesty. He
did not take the title of king; and, in concert with his brother Carloman, he went to seek, Heaven knows in
what obscure asylum, a forgotten Merovingian, son of Chilperic II., the last but one of the sluggard kings, and
made him king, the last of his line, with the title of Childeric III., himself, as well as his brother, taking only
the style of mayor of the palace. But at the end of ten years, and when he saw himself alone at the head of the
Frankish dominion, Pepin considered the moment arrived for putting an end to this fiction. In 751, he sent to
Pope Zachary at Rome, Burchard, bishop of Wurtzhurg, and Fulrad, abbot of St. Denis, "to consult the
Pontiff," says Eginhard, "on the subject of the kings then existing amongst the Franks, and who bore only the
name of king without enjoying a tittle of royal authority." The Pope, whom St. Boniface, the great missionary
of Germany, had prepared for the question, answered that "it was better to give the title of king to him who
exercised the sovereign power;" and next year, in March, 752, in the presence and with the assent of the
general assembly of "leudes" and bishops gathered together at Soissons, Pepin was proclaimed king of the
Franks, and received from the hand of St. Boniface the sacred anointment. They cut off the hair of the last
Merovingian phantom, Childeric III., and put him away in the monastery of St. Sithiu, at St. Omer. Two years
later, July 28, 754, Pope Stephen II., having come to France to claim Pepin's support against the Lombards,
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after receiving from him assurance of it, "anointed him afresh with the holy oil in the church of St. Denis to do
honor in his person to the dignity of royalty," and conferred the same honor on the king's two sons, Charles
and Carloman. The new Gallo-Frankish kingship and the Papacy, in the name of their common faith and
common interests, thus contracted an intimate alliance. The young Charles was hereafter to become
Charlemagne.
The same year, Boniface, whom, six years before, Pope Zachary had made Archbishop of Mayence, gave up
one day the episcopal dignity to his disciple Lullus, charging him to carry on the different works himself had
commenced amongst the churches of Germany, and to uphold the faith of the people. "As for me," he added,
"I will put myself on my road, for the time of my passing away approacheth. I have longed for this departure,
and none can turn me from it; wherefore, my son, get all things ready, and place in the chest with my books
the winding-sheet to wrap up my old body." And so he departed with some of his priests and servants to go
and evangelize the Frisons, the majority of whom were still pagans and barbarians. He pitched his tent on their
territory and was arranging to celebrate there the Lord's Supper, when a band of natives came down and
rushed upon the archbishop's retinue. The servitors surrounded him, to defend him and themselves; and a
battle began. "Hold, hold, my children," cried the arch-bishop; "Scripture biddeth us return good for evil. This
is the day I have long desired, and the hour of our deliverance is at hand. Be strong in the Lord: hope in Him,
and He will save your souls." The barbarians slew the holy man and the majority of his company. A little
while after, the Christians of the neighborhood came in arms and recovered the body of St. Boniface. Near
him was a book, which was stained with blood, and seemed to have dropped from his hands; it contained
several works of the Fathers, and amongst others a writing of St. Ambrose "on the Blessing of Death." The
death of the pious missionary was as powerful as his preaching in converting Friesland. It was a mode of
conquest worthy of the Christian faith, and one of which the history of Christianity had already proved the
effectiveness.
St. Boniface did not confine himself to the evangelization of the pagans; he labored ardently in the Christian
Gallo-Frankish Church, to reform the manners and ecclesiastical discipline, and to assure, whilst justifying,
the moral influence of the clergy by example as well as precept. The Councils, which had almost fallen into
desuetude in Gaul, became once more frequent and active there; from 742 to 753 there may be counted seven,
presided over by St. Boniface, which exercised within the Church a salutary action. King Pepin, recognizing
the services which the Archbishop of Mayence had rendered him, seconded his reformatory efforts at one time
by giving the support of his royal authority to the canons of the Councils, held often simultaneously with and
almost confounded with the laic assemblies of the Franks, at another by doing justice to the protests of the
churches against the violence and spoliation to which they were subjected. "There was an important point,"
says M. Fauriel, "in respect of which the position of Charles Martel's sons turned out to be pretty nearly the
same as that of their father: it was touching the necessity of assigning to warriors a portion of the
ecclesiastical revenues. But they, being more religious, perhaps, than Charles Martel, or more impressed with
the importance of humoring the priestly power, were more vexed and more anxious about the necessity under
which they found themselves of continuing to despoil the churches and of persisting in a system which was
putting the finishing stroke to the ruin of all ecclesiastical discipline. They were more eager to mitigate the
evil and to offer the Church compensation for their share in this evil to which it was not in their power to put a
stop. Accordingly at the March parade held at Leptines in 743, it was decided, in reference to ecclesiastical
lands applied to the military service: 1st, that the churches having the ownership of those lands should share
the revenue with the lay holder; 2d, that on the death of a warrior in enjoyment of an ecclesiastical benefice,
the benefice should revert to the Church; 3d, that every benefice by deprivation whereof any church would be
reduced to poverty should be at once restored to her. That this capitular was carried out, or even capable of
being carried out, is very doubtful; but the less Carloman and Pepin succeeded in repairing the material losses
incurred by the Church since the accession of the Carlovingians, the more zealous they were in promoting the
growth of her moral power and the restoration of her discipline. . . . That was the time at which there began to
be seen the spectacle of the national assemblies of the Franks, the gatherings of the March parades
transformed into ecclesiastical synods under the presidency of the titular legate of the Roman Pontiff, and
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dictating, by the mouth of the political authority, regulations and laws with the direct and formal aim of
restoring divine worship and ecclesiastical discipline, and of assuring the spiritual welfare of the people."
(Fauriel, Histoire de la Gaule, &c., t. III., p. 224.)
Pepin, after he had been proclaimed king and had settled matters with the Church as well as the warlike
questions remaining for him to solve permitted, directed all his efforts towards the two countries which, after
his father's example, he longed to reunite to the Gallo-Frankish monarchy, that is, Septimania, still occupied
by the Arabs, and Aquitaine, the independence of which was stoutly and ably defended by Duke Eudes'
grandson, Duke Waifre. The conquest of Septimania was rather tedious than difficult. The Franks, after
having victoriously scoured the open country of the district, kept invested during three years its capital,
Narbonne, where the Arabs of Spain, much weakened by their dissensions, vainly tried to throw in
re-enforcements. Besides the Mussulman Arabs the population of the town numbered many Christian Goths,
who were tired of suffering for the defence of their oppressors, and who entered into secret negotiations with
the chiefs of Pepin's army, the end of which was, that they opened the gates of the town. In 759, then, after
forty years of Arab rule, Narbonne passed definitively under that of the Franks, who guaranteed to the
inhabitants free enjoyment of their Gothic or Roman law and of their local institutions. It even appears that, in
the province of Spain bordering on Septimania, an Arab chief, called Soliman, who was in command at
Gerona and Barcelona, between the Ebro and the Pyrenees, submitted to Pepin, himself and the country under
him. This was an important event indeed in the reign of Pepin, for here was the point at which Islamism, but
lately aggressive and victorious in Southern Europe, began to feel definitively beaten and to recoil before
Christianity.
The conquest of Aquitaine and Vasconia was much more keenly disputed and for a much longer time
uncertain. Duke Waifre was as able in negotiation as in war: at one time he seemed to accept the pacific
overtures of Pepin, or, perhaps, himself made similar, without bringing about any result, at another he went to
seek and found even in Germany allies who caused Pepin much embarrassment and peril. The population of
Aquitaine hated the Franks; and the war, which for their duke was a question of independent sovereignty, was
for themselves a question of passionate national feeling. Pepin, who was naturally more humane and even
more generous, it may be said, in war than his predecessors had usually been, was nevertheless induced, in his
struggle against the Duke of Aquitaine, to ravage without mercy the countries he scoured, and to treat the
vanquished with great harshness. It was only after nine years' war and seven campaigns full of vicissitudes
that he succeeded, not in conquering his enemy in a decisive battle, but in gaining over some servants who
betrayed their master. In the month of July, 759, "Duke Waifre was slain by his own folk, by the king's
advice," says Fredegaire; and the conquest of all Southern Gaul carried the extent and power of the
Gallo-Frankish monarchy farther and higher than it had ever yet been, even under Clovis.
In 753, Pepin had made an expedition against the Britons of Armorica, had taken Vannes, and "subjugated,"
add certain chroniclers, "the whole of Brittany." In point of fact Brittany was no more subjugated by Pepin
than by his predecessors; all that can be said is, that the Franks resumed, under him, an aggressive attitude
towards the Britons, as if to vindicate a right of sovereignty.
Exactly at this epoch Pepin was engaging in a matter which did not allow him to scatter his forces hither and
thither. It has been stated already, that in 741 Pope Gregory III. had asked aid of the Franks against the
Lombards who were threatening Rome, and that, whilst fully entertaining the Pope's wishes, Charles Martel
had been in no hurry to interfere by deed in the quarrel. Twelve years later, in 753, Pope Stephen, in his turn
threatened by Astolphus, king of the Lombards, after vain attempts to obtain guarantees of peace, repaired to
Paris, and renewed to Pepin the entreaties used by Zachary. It was difficult for Pepin to turn a deaf ear; it was
Zachary who had declared that he ought to be made king; Stephen showed readiness to anoint him a second
time, himself and his sons; and it was the eldest of these sons, Charles, scarcely twelve years old, whom
Pepin, on learning the near arrival of the Pope, had sent to meet him and give brilliancy to his reception.
Stephen passed the winter at St. Denis, and gained the favor of the people as well as that of the king.
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Astolphus peremptorily refused to listen to the remonstrances of Pepin, who called upon him to evacuate the
towns in the exarchate of Ravenna, and to leave the Pope unmolested in the environs of Rome as well as in
Rome itself. At the March parade held at Braine, in the spring of 754, the Franks approved of the war against
the Lombards; and at the end of the summer Pepin and his army descended into Italy by Mount Cenis, the
Lombards trying in vain to stop them as they debouched into the valley of Suza. Astolphus beaten, and, before
long, shut up in Pavia, promised all that was demanded of him; and Pepin and his warriors, laden with booty,
returned to France, leaving at Rome the Pope, who conjured them to remain a while in Italy, for to a certainty,
he said, king Astolphus would not keep his promises. The Pope was right. So soon as the Franks had gone, the
King of the Lombards continued occupying the places in the exarchate and molesting the neighborhood of
Rome. The Pope, in despair and doubtful of his auxiliaries' return, conceived the idea of sending "to the king,
the chiefs, and the people of the Franks, a letter written, he said, by Peter, Apostle of Jesus Christ, Son of the
living God, to announce to them that, if they came in haste, he would aid them as if he were alive according to
the flesh amongst them, that they would conquer all their enemies and make themselves sure of eternal life!"
The plan was perfectly successful: the Franks once more crossed the Alps with enthusiasm, once more
succeeded in beating the Lombards, and once more shut up in Pavia King Astolphus, who was eager to
purchase peace at any price. He obtained it on two principal conditions: 1st, that he would not again make a
hostile attack on Roman territory or wage war against the Pope or people of Rome; 2d, that he would
henceforth recognize the sovereignty of the Franks, pay them tribute, and cede forthwith to Pepin the towns
and all the lands, belonging to the jurisdiction of the Roman empire, which were at that time occupied by the
Lombards. By virtue of these conditions, Ravenna, Rimini, Pesaro, that is to say, the Romagna, the Duchy of
Urbino and a portion of the Marches of Ancona, were at once given up to Pepin, who, regarding them as his
own direct conquest, the fruit of victory, disposed of them forthwith, in favor of the Popes, by that famous
deed of gift which comprehended pretty nearly what has since formed the Roman States, and which founded
the temporal independence of the Papacy, the guarantee of its independence in the exercise of the spiritual
power.
At the head of the Franks as mayor of the palace from 741, and as king from 752, Pepin had completed in
France and extended in Italy the work which his father, Charles Martel, had begun and carried on, from 714 to
741, in State and Church. He left France reunited in one and placed at the head of Christian Europe. He died at
the monastery of St. Denis, September 18, 768, leaving his kingdom and his dynasty thus ready to the hands
of his son, whom history has dubbed Charlemagne.
CHAPTER X
The original and dominant characteristic of the hero of this reign, that which won for him, and keeps for him
after more than ten centuries, the name of Great, is the striking variety of his ambition, his faculties, and his
deeds. Charlemagne aspired to and attained to every sort of greatness, military greatness, political greatness,
and intellectual greatness; he was an able warrior, an energetic legislator, a hero of poetry. And he united, he
displayed all these merits in a time of general and monotonous barbarism, when, save in the Church, the
minds of men were dull and barren. Those men, few in number, who made themselves a name at that epoch,
rallied round Charlemagne and were developed under his patronage. To know him well and appreciate him
justly, he must be examined under those various grand aspects, abroad and at home, in his wars and in his
government.
In Guizot's History of Civilization in France is to be found a complete table of the wars of Charlemagne, of
his many different expeditions in Germany, Italy, Spain, all the countries, in fact, that became his dominion. A
summary will here suffice. From 769 to 813, in Germany and Western and Northern Europe, Charlemagne
conducted thirty-one campaigns against the Saxons, Frisons, Bavarians, Avars, Slavons, and Danes; in Italy,
five against the Lombards; in Spain, Corsica, and Sardinia, twelve against the Arabs; two against the Greeks;
and three in Gaul itself, against the Aquitanians and the Britons; in all, fifty-three expeditions; amongst which
those he undertook against the Saxons, the Lombards, and the Arabs, were long and difficult wars. It is
undesirable to recount them in detail, for the relation would be monotonous and useless; but it is obligatory to
make fully known their causes, their characteristic incidents, and their results.
It has already been seen that, under the last Merovingian kings, the Saxons were, on the right bank of the
Rhine, in frequent collision with the Franks, especially with the Austrasian Franks, whose territory they were
continually threatening and often invading. Pepin the Short had more than once hurled them back far from the
very uncertain frontiers of Germanic Austrasia; and, on becoming king, he dealt his blows still farther, and
entered, in his turn, Saxony itself. "In spite of the Saxons' stout resistance," says Eginhard (Annales, t. i., p.
135), "he pierced through the points they had fortified to bar entrance into their country, and, after having
fought here and there battles wherein fell many Saxons, he forced them to promise that they would submit to
his rule; and that, every year, to do him honor, they would send to the general assembly of the Franks a
present of three hundred horses. When these conventions were once settled, he insisted, to insure their
performance, upon placing them under the guarantee of rites peculiar to the Saxons; then he returned with his
army to Gaul."
Charlemagne did not confine himself to resuming his father's work; he before long changed its character and
its scope. In 772, being left sole master of France after the death of his brother Carloman, he convoked at
Worms the general assembly of the Franks, "and took," says Eginhard, "the resolution of going and carrying
war into Saxony. He invaded it without delay, laid it waste with fire and sword, made himself master of the
fort of Ehresburg, and threw down the idol that the Saxons called Irminsul." And in what place was this first
victory of Charlemagne won? Near the sources of the Lippe, just where, more than seven centuries before, the
For thirty years such was its character. Charlemagne regarded the conquest of Saxony as indispensable for
putting a stop to the incursions of the Saxons, and the conversion of the Saxons to Christianity as
indispensable for assuring the conquest of Saxony. The Saxons were defending at one and the same time the
independence of their country and the gods of their fathers. Here was wherewithal to stir up and foment, on
both sides, the profoundest passions; and they burst forth, on both sides, with equal fury. Whithersoever
Charlemagne penetrated he built strong castles and churches; and, at his departure, left garrisons and
missionaries. When he was gone the Saxons returned, attacked the forts and massacred the garrisons and the
missionaries. At the commencement of the struggle, a priest of Anglo-Saxon origin, whom St. Willibrod,
bishop of Utrecht, had but lately consecrated, St. Liebwin in fact, undertook to go and preach the Christian
religion in the very heart of Saxony, on the banks of the Weser, amidst the general assembly of the Saxons.
"What do ye" said he, cross in hand; "the idols ye worship live not, neither do they perceive: they are the work
of men's hands; they can do nought either for themselves or for others. Wherefore the one God, good and just,
having compassion on your errors, hath sent me unto you. If ye put not away your iniquity, I foretell unto you
a trouble that ye do not expect, and that the King of Heaven hath ordained aforetime; there shall come a
prince, strong and wise and indefatigable, not from afar, but from nigh at hand, to fall upon you like a torrent,
in order to soften your hard hearts and bow down your proud heads. At one rush he shall invade the country;
he shall lay it waste with fire and sword, and carry away your wives and children into captivity." A thrill of
rage ran through the assembly; and already many of those present had begun to cut, in the neighboring woods,
stakes sharpened to a point to pierce the priest, when one of the chieftains named Buto cried aloud, "Listen, ye
who are the most wise. There have often come unto us ambassadors from neighboring peoples, Northmen,
Slavons or Frisons; we have received them in peace, and when their messages have been heard, they have
been sent away with a present. Here is an ambassador from a great God, and ye would slay him!" Whether it
were from sentiment or from prudence, the multitude was calmed, or at any rate restrained; and for this time
the priest retired safe and sound.
Just as the pious zeal of the missionaries was of service to Charlemagne, so did the power of Charlemagne
support and sometimes preserve the missionaries. The mob, even in the midst of its passions, is not
throughout or at all times inaccessible to fear. The Saxons were not one and the same nation, constantly united
in one and the same assembly and governed by a single chieftain. Three populations of the same race,
distinguished by names borrowed from their geographical situation, just as had happened amongst the Franks
in the case of the Austrasians and Neustrians, to wit, Eastphalian or eastern Saxons, Westphalian or western,
and Angrians, formed the Saxon confederation. And to them was often added a fourth peoplet of the same
origin, closer to the Danes and called North-Albingians, inhabitants of the northern district of the Elbe. These
four principal Saxon populations were sub-divided into a large number of tribes, who had their own particular
chieftains, and who often decided, each for itself, their conduct and their fate. Charlemagne, knowing how to
profit by this want of cohesion and unity amongst his foes, attacked now one and now another of the large
Saxon peoplets or the small Saxon tribes, and dealt separately with each of them, according as he found them
inclined to submission or resistance. After having, in four or five successive expeditions, gained victories and
sustained checks, he thought himself sufficiently advanced in his conquest to put his relations with the Saxons
to a grand trial. In 777, he resolved, says Eginhard, "to go and hold, at the place called Paderborn (close to
There had been absent from this great meeting a Saxon chieftain called Wittikind, son of Wernekind, king of
the Saxons at the north of the Elbe. He had espoused the sister of Siegfried, king of the Danes; and he was the
friend of Ratbod, king of the Frisons. A true chieftain at heart as well as by descent, he was made to be the
But the vengeance did not put an end to the war. "Blood calls for blood," were words spoken in the English
parliament, in 1643, by Sir Benjamin Rudyard, one of the best citizens of his country in her hour of
revolution. For three years Charlemagne had to redouble his efforts to accomplish in Saxony, at the cost of
Frankish as well as Saxon blood, his work of conquest and conversion: "Saxony," he often repeated, "must be
christianized or wiped out." At last, in 785, after several victories which seemed decisive, he went and settled
down in his strong castle of Ehresburg, "whither he made his wife and children come, being resolved to
remain there all the bad season," says Eginhard, and applying himself without cessation to scouring the
country of the Saxons and wearing them out by his strong and indomitable determination. But determination
did not blind him to prudence and policy. "Having learned that Wittikind and Abbio (another great Saxon
chieftain) were abiding in the part of Saxony situated on the other side of the Elbe, he sent to them Saxon
envoys to prevail upon them to renounce their perfidy, and come, without hesitation, and trust themselves to
him. They, conscious of what they had attempted, dared not at first trust to the king's word; but having
obtained from him the promise they desired of impunity, and, besides, the hostages they demanded as
guarantee of their safety, and who were brought to them, on the king's behalf, by Amalwin, one of the officers
of his court, they came with the said lord and presented themselves before the king in his palace of Attigny
[Attigny-sur-Aisne, whither Charlemagne had now returned] and there received baptism."
Charlemagne did more than amnesty Wittikind; he named him Duke of Saxony, but without attaching to the
title any right of sovereignty. Wittikind, on his side, did more than come to Attigny and get baptized there; he
gave up the struggle, remained faithful to his new engagements, and led, they say, so Christian a life, that
some chroniclers have placed him on the list of saints. He was killed in 807, in a battle against Gerold, duke of
Suabia, and his tomb is still to be seen at Ratisbonne. Several families of Germany hold him for their ancestor;
and some French genealogists have, without solid ground, discovered in him the grandfather of Robert the
Strong, great-grandfather of Hugh Capet. However that may be, after making peace with Wittikind,
Charlemagne had still, for several years, many insurrections to repress and much rigor to exercise in Saxony,
including the removal of certain Saxon peoplets out of their country and the establishment of foreign colonists
in the territories thus become vacant; but the great war was at an end, and Charlemagne might consider
He had still, in Germany and all around, many enemies to fight and many campaigns to re-open. Even
amongst the Germanic populations, which were regarded as reduced under the sway of the king of the Franks,
some, the Frisons and Saxons as well as others, were continually agitating for the recovery of their
independence. Farther off towards the north, east, and south, people differing in origin and
language—Avars, Huns, Slavons, Bulgarians, Danes, and Northmen—were still pressing or
beginning to press upon the frontiers of the Frankish dominion, for the purpose of either penetrating within or
settling at the threshold as powerful and formidable neighbors. Charlemagne had plenty to do, with the view
at one time of checking their incursions and at another of destroying or hurling back to a distance their
settlements; and he brought his usual vigor and perseverance to bear on this second struggle. But by the
conquest of Saxony he had attained his direct national object: the great flood of population from East to West
came, and broke against the Gallo-Franco- Germanic dominion as against an insurmountable rampart.
To place textually before the reader a fragment of an old chronicle will serve better than any modern
description to show the impression of admiration and fear produced upon his contemporaries by Charlemagne,
his person and his power. At the close of this ninth century a monk of the abbey of St. Gall, in Switzerland,
had collected, direct from the mouth of one of Charlemagne's warriors, Adalbert, numerous stories of his
campaigns and his life. These stories are full of fabulous legends, puerile anecdotes, distorted reminiscences,
and chronological errors, and they are written sometimes with a credulity and exaggeration of language which
raise a smile; but they reveal the state of men's minds and fancies within the circle of Charlemagne's influence
and at the sight of him. This monk gives a naive account of Charlemagne's arrival before Pavia and of the king
of the Lombards' disquietude at his approach. Didier had with him at that time one of Charlemagne's most
famous comrades, Ogier the Dane, who fills a prominent place in the romances and epopoeas, relating to
chivalry, of that age. Ogier had quarrelled with his great chief and taken refuge with the king of the Lombards.
It is probable that his Danish origin and his relations with the king of the Danes, Gottfried, for a long time an
enemy of the Franks, had something to do with his misunderstanding with Charlemagne. However that may
have been, "when Didier and Ogger (for so the monk calls him) heard that the dread monarch was coming,
they ascended a tower of vast height, whence they could watch his arrival from afar off and from every
quarter. They saw, first of all, engines of war such as must have been necessary for the armies of Darius or
Julius Caesar. 'Is not Charles,' asked Didier of Ogger, 'with this great army?' But the other answered, 'No.' The
Lombard, seeing afterwards an immense body of soldiery gathered from all quarters of the vast empire, said to
Ogger, 'Certes, Charles advanceth in triumph in the midst of this throng.' 'No, not yet; he will not appear so
soon,' was the answer. 'What should we do, then,' rejoined Didier, who began to be perturbed, 'should he come
accompanied by a larger band of warriors?' 'You will see what he is when he comes,' replied Ogger, 'but as to
what will become of us I know nothing.' As they were thus parleying appeared the body of guards that knew
no repose; and at this sight the Lombard, overcome with dread, cried, 'This time 'tis surely Charles.' 'No,'
answered Ogger, 'not yet.' In their wake came the bishops, the abbots, the ordinaries of the chapels royal, and
the counts; and then Didier, no longer able to bear the light of day or to face death, cried out with groans, 'Let
us descend and hide ourselves in the bowels of the earth, far from the face and the fury of so terrible a foe.
Trembling the while, Ogger, who knew by experience what were the power and might of Charles, and who
The monk of St. Gall does King Didier and his people wrong. They showed more firmness and valor than he
ascribes to them: they resisted Charlemagne obstinately, and repulsed his first assaults so well that he changed
the siege into an investment and settled down before Pavia, as if making up his mind for a long operation. His
camp became a town; he sent for Queen Hildegarde and her court; and he had a chapel built, where he
celebrated the festival of Christmas. But on the arrival of spring, close upon the festival of Easter, 774,
wearied with the duration of the investment, he left to his lieutenants the duty of keeping it up, and, attended
by a numerous and brilliant following, set off for Rome, whither the Pope was urgently pressing him to come.
On Holy Saturday, April 1, 774, Charlemagne found, at three miles from Rome, the magistrates and the
banner of the city, sent forward by the Pope to meet him; at one mile all the municipal bodies and the pupils
of the schools carrying palm-branches and singing hymns; and at the gate of the city, the cross, which was
never taken out save for exarchs and patricians. At sight of the cross Charlemagne dismounted, entered Rome
on foot, ascended the steps of the ancient basilica of St. Peter, repeating at each step a sign of respectful piety,
and was received at the top by the Pope himself. All around him and in the streets a chant was sung, "Blessed
be he that cometh in the name of the Lord!" At his entry and during his sojourn at Rome Charlemagne gave
the most striking proofs of Christian faith and respect for the head of the Church. According to the custom of
pilgrims he visited all the basilicas, and in that of St. Maria Maggiore he performed his solemn devotions.
Then, passing to temporal matters, he caused to be brought and read over, in his private conferences with the
Pope, the deed of territorial gift made by his father Pepin to Stephen II., and with his own lips dictated the
confirmation of it, adding thereto a new gift of certain territories which he was in course of wresting by
conquest from the Lombards. Pope Adrian, on his side, rendered to him, with a mixture of affection and
dignity, all the honors and all the services which could at one and the same time satisfy and exalt the king and
the priest, the protector and the protected. He presented to Charlemagne a book containing a collection of the
canons written by the pontiffs from the origin of the Church, and he put at the beginning of the book, which
was dedicated to Charlemagne, an address in forty-five irregular verses, written with his own hand, which
formed an anagram: "Pope Adrian to his most excellent son Charlemagne, king." (Domino excellentissimo
filio Carolo Magno regi Ipadrianus papa). At the same time he encouraged him to push his victory to the
utmost and make himself king of the Lombards, advising him, however, not to incorporate his conquest with
The prompt success of this war in Italy, undertaken at the appeal of the Head of the Church, this first sojourn
of Charlemagne at Rome, the spectacles he had witnessed, and the homage he had received, exercised over
him, his plans, and his deeds, a powerful influence. This rough Frankish warrior, chief of a people who were
beginning to make a brilliant appearance upon the stage of the world, and issue himself of a new line, had a
taste for what was grand, splendid, ancient, and consecrated by time and public respect; he understood and
estimated at its full worth the moral force and importance of such allies. He departed from Rome in 774, more
determined than ever to subdue Saxony, to the advantage of the Church as well as of his own power, and to
promote, in the South as in the North, the triumph of the Frankish Christian dominion.
Three years afterwards, in 777, he had convoked at Paderborn, in Westphalia, that general assembly of his
different peoples at which Wittikind did not attend, and which was destined to bring upon the Saxons a more
and more obstinate war. "The Saracen Ibn-al-Arabi," says Eginhard, "came to this town, to present himself
before the king. He had arrived from Spain, together with other Saracens in his train, to surrender to the king
of the Franks himself and all the towns which the king of the Saracens had confided to his keeping." For a
long time past the Christians of the West had given the Mussulmans, Arab or other, the name of Saracens.
Ibn-al-Arabi was governor of Saragossa, and one of the Spanish Arab chieftains in league against
Abdel-Rhaman, the last offshoot of the Ommiad khalifs, who, with the assistance of the Berbers, had seized
the government of Spain. Amidst the troubles of his country and his nation, Ibn-al-Arabi summoned to his aid,
against Abdel-Rhaman, the Franks and the Christians, just as, but lately, Maurontius, duke of Arles, had
summoned to Provence, against Charles Martel, the Arabs and the Mussulmans.
Charlemagne accepted the summons with alacrity. With the coming of spring in the following year, 778, and
with the full assent of his chief warriors, he began his march towards the Pyrenees, crossed the Loire, and
halted at Casseneuil, at the confluence of the Lot and the Garonne, to celebrate there the festival of Easter, and
to make preparations for his expedition thence. As he had but lately done for his campaign in Italy against the
Lombards, he divided his forces into two armies one composed of Austrasians, Neustrians, Burgundians, and
divers German contingents, and commanded by Charlemagne in person, was to enter Spain by the valley of
Roncesvalles, in the western Pyrenees, and make for Pampeluna; the other, consisting of Provenccals,
Septimanians, Lombards, and other populations of the South, under the command of Duke Bernard, who had
already distinguished himself in Italy, had orders to penetrate into Spain by the eastern Pyrenees, to receive on
the march the submission of Gerona and Barcelona, and not to halt till they were before Saragossa, where the
two armies were to form a junction, and which Ibn- al-Arabi had promised to give up to the king of the
Franks. According to this plan, Charlemagne had to traverse the territories of Aquitaine and Vasconia,
domains of Duke Lupus II., son of Duke Waifre, so long the foe of Pepin the Short, a Merovingian by descent,
and in all these qualities little disposed to favor Charlemagne. However, the march was accomplished without
difficulty. The king of the Franks treated his powerful vassal well; and Duke Lupus swore to him afresh, "or
for the first time," says M. Fauriel, "submission and fidelity; but the event soon proved that it was not without
umbrage or without all the feelings of a true son of Waifre that he saw the Franks and the son of Pepin so
The aggressive campaign was an easy and a brilliant one. Charles with his army entered Spain by the valley of
Roncesvalles without encountering any obstacle. On his arrival before Pampeluna the Arab governor
surrendered the place to him, and Charlemagne pushed forward vigorously to Saragossa. But there fortune
changed. The presence of foreigners and Christians on the soil of Spain caused a suspension of interior
quarrels amongst the Arabs, who rose in mass, at all points, to succor Saragossa. The besieged defended
themselves with obstinacy; there was more scarcity of provisions amongst the besiegers than inside the place;
sickness broke out amongst them; they were incessantly harassed from without; and rumors of a fresh rising
amongst the Saxons reached Charlemagne. The Arabs demanded negotiation. To decide the king of the Franks
upon an abandonment of the siege, they offered him "an immense quantity of gold," say the chroniclers,
hostages, and promises of homage and fidelity. Appearances had been saved; Charlemagne could say, and
even perhaps believe, that he had pushed his conquests as far as the Ebro; he decided on retreat, and all the
army was set in motion to recross the Pyrenees. On arriving before Pampeluna, Charlemagne had its walls
completely razed to the ground, "in order that," as he said, "that city might not be able to revolt." The troops
entered those same passes of Roncesvalles which they had traversed without obstacle a few weeks before; and
the advance-guard and the main body of the army were already clear of them. The account of what happened
shall be given in the words of Eginhard, the only contemporary historian whose account, free from all
exaggeration, can be considered authentic. "The king," he says, "brought back his army without experiencing
any loss, save that at the summit of the Pyrenees he suffered somewhat from the perfidy of the Vascons
(Basques). Whilst the army of the Franks, embarrassed in a narrow defile, was forced by the nature of the
ground to advance in one long, close line, the Basques, who were in ambush on the crest of the mountain (for
the thickness of the forest with which these parts are covered is favorable to ambuscade), descend and fall
suddenly on the baggage-train and on the troops of the rear-guard, whose duty it was to cover all in their front,
and precipitate them to the bottom of the valley. There took place a fight in which the Franks were killed to a
man. The Basques, after having plundered the baggage-train, profited by the night, which had come on, to
disperse rapidly. They owed all their success in this engagement to the lightness of their equipment and to the
nature of the spot where the action took place; the Franks, on the contrary, being heavily armed and in an
unfavorable position, struggled against too many disadvantages. Eginhard, master of the household of the
king; Anselm, count of the palace; and Roland, prefect of the marches of Brittany, fell in this engagement.
There were no means, at the time, of taking revenge for this cheek; for after their sudden attack, the enemy
dispersed to such good purpose that there was no gaining any trace of the direction in which they should be
sought for."
History says no more; but in the poetry of the people there is a longer and a more faithful memory than in the
court of kings. The disaster of Roncesvalles and the heroism of the warriors who perished there became, in
The political genius of Charlemagne comprehended more fully than would be imagined from his panegyrist's
brief and dry account all the gravity of the affair of Roncesvalles. Not only did he take immediate vengeance
by hanging Duke Lupus of Aquitaine, whose treason had brought down this mishap, and by reducing his two
sons, Adairic and Sancho, to a more feeble and precarious condition, but he resolved to treat Aquitaine as he
had but lately treated Italy, that is to say, to make of it, according to the correct definition of M. Fauriel, "a
special kingdom," an integral portion, indeed, of the Frankish empire, but with an especial destination, which
was that of resisting the invasions of the Andalusian Arabs, and confining them as much as possible to the soil
of the Peninsula. This was, in some sort, giving back to the country its primary task as an independent duchy;
and it was the most natural and most certain way of making the Aquitanians useful subjects by giving play to
their national vanity, to their pretensions of forming a separate people, and to their hopes of once more
becoming, sooner or later, an independent nation. Queen Hildegarde, during her husband's sojourn at
Casseneuil, in 778, had borne him a son, whom he called Louis, and who was, afterwards, Louis the
Debonnair. Charlemagne, summoned a second time to Rome, in 781, by the quarrels of Pope Adrian I. with
the imperial court of Constantinople, brought with him his two sons, Pepin aged only four years, and Louis
only three years, and had them anointed by the Pope, the former King of Italy, and the latter King of
Aquitaine. "On returning from Rome to Austrasia, Charlemagne sent Louis at once to take possession of his
kingdom. From the banks of the Meuse to Orleans the little prince was carried in his cradle; but once on the
Loire, this manner of travelling beseemed him no longer; his conductors would that his entry into his
dominions should have a manly and warrior-like appearance; they clad him in arms proportioned to his height
and age; they put him and held him on horseback; and it was in such guise that he entered Aquitaine. He came
thither accompanied by the officers who were to form his council of guardians, men chosen by Charlemagne,
with care, amongst the Frankish 'leudes,' distinguished not only for bravery and firmness, but also for
adroitness, and such as they should be to be neither deceived nor seared by the cunning, fickle, and turbulent
populations with whom they would have to deal." From this period to the death of Charlemagne, and by his
sovereign influence, though all the while under his son's name, the government of Aquitaine was a series of
continued efforts to hurl back the Arabs of Spain beyond the Ebro, to extend to that river the dominion of the
Franks, to divert to that end the forces as well as the feelings of the populations of Southern Gaul, and thus to
pursue, in the South as in the North, against the Arabs as well as against the Saxons and Huns, the grand
design of Charlemagne, which was the repression of foreign invasions and the triumph of Christian France
over Asiatic Paganism and Islamism.
Although continually obliged to watch, and often still to fight, Charlemagne might well believe that he had
nearly gained his end. He had everywhere greatly extended the frontiers of the Frankish dominions and
subjugated the populations comprised in his conquests. He had proved that his new frontiers would be
vigorously defended against new invasions or dangerous neighbors. He had pursued the Huns and the Saxons
to the confines of the empire of the East, and the Saracens to the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. The centre of
the dominion was no longer in ancient Gaul; he had transferred it to a point not far from the Rhine, in the
midst and within reach of the Germanic populations, at the town of Aix-la-Chapelle, which he had founded,
and which was his favorite residence; but the principal parts of the Gallo-Frankish kingdom, Austrasia,
In 799 he received, at Aix-la-Chapelle, news of serious disturbances which had broken out at Rome; that Pope
Leo III. had been attacked by conspirators, who, after pulling out, it was said, his eyes and his tongue, had
shut him up in the monastery of St. Erasmus, whence he had with great difficulty escaped, and that he had
taken refuge with Winigisius, duke of Spoleto, announcing his intention of repairing thence to the Frankish
king. Leo was already known to Charlemagne; at his accession to the pontificate, in 795, he had sent to him,
as to the patrician and defender of Rome, the keys of the prison of St. Peter and the banner of the city.
Charlemagne showed a disposition to receive him with equal kindness and respect. The Pope arrived, in fact,
at Paderborn, passed some days there, according to Eginhard, and returned to Rome on the 30th of November,
799, at ease regarding his future, but without knowledge on the part of any one of what had been settled
between the king of the Franks and him. Charlemagne remained all the winter at Aix-la-Chapelle, spent the
first months of the year 800 on affairs connected with Western France, at Rouen, Tours, Orleans, and Paris,
and, returning to Mayence in the month of August, then for the first time announced to the general assembly
of Franks his design of making a journey to Italy. He repaired thither, in fact, and arrived on the 23d of
November, 800, at the gates of Rome. The Pope received him there as he was dismounting; then, the next day,
standing on the steps of the basilica of St. Peter and amidst general hallelujahs, he introduced the king into the
sanctuary of the blessed apostle, glorifying and thanking the Lord for this happy event. Some days were spent
in examining into the grievances which had been set down to the Pope's account, and in receiving two monks
arrived from Jerusalem to present to the king, with the patriarch's blessing, the keys of the Holy Sepulchre and
Calvary, as well as the sacred standard. Lastly, on the 25th of December, 800, "the day of the Nativity of our
Lord," says Eginhard, "the king came into the basilica of the blessed St. Peter, apostle, to attend the
celebration of mass. At the moment when, in his place before the altar, he was bowing down to pray, Pope
Leo placed on his head a crown, and all the Roman people shouted, 'Long life and victory to Charles
Augustus, crowned by God, the great and pacific emperor of the Romans!' After this proclamation the pontiff
prostrated himself before him and paid him adoration, according to the custom established in the days of the
old emperors; and thenceforward Charles, giving up the title of patrician, bore that of Emperor and Augustus."
Eginhard adds, in his Life of Charlemagne, "The king at first testified great aversion for this dignity, for he
declared that, notwithstanding the importance of the festival, he would not on that day have entered the
church, if he could have foreseen the intentions of the sovereign pontiff. However, this event excited the
jealousy of the Roman emperors (of Constantinople), who showed great vexation at it; but Charles met their
bad graces with nothing but great patience, and thanks to this magnanimity, which raised him so far above
them, he managed, by sending to them frequent embassies and giving them in his letters the name of brother,
to triumph over their conceit."
No one, probably, believed in the ninth century, and no one, assuredly, will nowadays believe, that
Charlemagne was innocent beforehand of what took place on the 25th of December, 800, in the basilica of St.
Peter. It is doubtful, also, if he were seriously concerned about the ill-temper of the emperors of the East. He
had wit enough to understand the value which always remains attached to old traditions, and he might have
taken some pains to secure their countenance to his title of emperor; but all his contemporaries believed, and
he also undoubtedly believed, that he had on that day really won and set up again the Roman empire.
CHAPTER XI.
A word of warning must be first of all given touching this word government, with which it is impossible to
dispense. For a long time past the word has entailed ideas of national unity, general organization, and regular
and efficient power. There has been no lack of revolutions which have changed dynasties and the principles
and forms of the supreme power in the State; but they have always left existing, under different names, the
practical machinery whereby the supreme power makes itself felt and exercises its various functions over the
whole country. Open the Almanac, whether it be called the Imperial, the Royal, or the National, and you will
find there always the working system of the government of France; all the powers and their agents, from the
lowest to the highest, are there indicated and classed according to their prerogatives and relations. Nor have
we there a mere empty nomenclature, a phantom of theory; things go on actually as they are
described—the book is the reflex of the reality. It were easy to construct, for the empire of
Charlemagne, a similar list of officers; there might be set down in it dukes, counts, vicars, centeniers, and
sheriffs (seabini), and they might be distributed, in regular gradation, over the whole territory; but it would be
one huge lie; for most frequently, in the majority of places, these magistracies were utterly powerless and
themselves in complete disorder. The efforts of Charlemagne, either to establish them on a firm footing or to
make them act with regularity, were continual, but unavailing. In spite of the fixity of his purpose and the
energy of his action, the disorder around him was measureless and insurmountable. He might check it for a
moment at one point; but the evil existed wherever his terrible will did not reach, and wherever it did the evil
broke out again so soon as it had been withdrawn. How could it be otherwise? Charlemagne had not to
grapple with one single nation or with one single system of institutions; he had to deal with different nations,
without cohesion, and foreign one to another. The authority belonged, at one and the same time, to assemblies
of free men, to landholders over the dwellers on their domains, and to the king over the "leudes" and their
following. These three powers appeared and acted side by side in every locality as well as in the totality of the
State. Their relations and their prerogatives were not governed by any generally- recognized principle, and
Whoever is astonished either at this triumph of absolute monarchy through the personal movement of
Charlemagne, or at the speedy fall of the fabric on the disappearance of the moving spirit, understands neither
what can be done by a great man, when without him society sees itself given over to deadly peril, nor how
unsubstantial and frail is absolute power when the great man is no longer by, or when society has no longer
need of him.
It has just been shown how Charlemagne by his wars, which had for their object and result permanent and
well-secured conquests, had stopped the fresh incursions of barbarians, that is, had stopped disorder coming
from without. An attempt will now be made to show by what means he set about suppressing disorder from
within and putting his own rule in the place of the anarchy that prevailed in the Roman world which lay in
ruins, and in the barbaric world which was a prey to blind and ill-regulated force.
Far from the centre of the State, in what have since been called the provinces, the power of the emperor was
exercised by the medium of two classes of agents, one local and permanent, the other despatched from the
centre and transitory.
1st. The dukes, counts, vicars of counts, centeniers, sheriffs (scabini), officers or magistrates residing on the
spot, nominated by the emperor himself or by his delegates, and charged with the duty of acting in his name
for the levying of troops, rendering of justice, maintenance of order, and receipt of imposts.
2d. The beneficiaries or vassals of the emperor, who held of him, sometimes as hereditaments, more often for
life, and more often still without fixed rule or stipulation, lands; domains, throughout the extent of which they
exercised, a little bit in their own name and a little bit in the name of the emperor, a certain jurisdiction and
nearly all the rights of sovereignty. There was nothing very fixed or clear in the position of the beneficiaries
and in the nature of their power; they were at one and the same time delegates and independent, owners and
enjoyers of usufruct, and the former or the latter character prevailed amongst them according to
circumstances. But, altogether, they were closely bound to Charlemagne, who, in a great number of cases,
charged them with the execution of his orders in the lands they occupied.
Above these agents, local and resident, magistrates or beneficiaries, were the missi dominici, temporary
commissioners, charged to inspect, in the emperor's name, the condition of the provinces; authorized to
penetrate into the interior of the free lands as well as of the domains granted with the title of benefices; having
the right to reform certain abuses, and bound to render an account of all to their master. The missi dominici
were the principal instruments Charlemagne had, throughout the vast territory of his empire, of order and
administration.
As to the central government, setting aside for a moment the personal action of Charlemagne and of his
counsellors, the general assemblies, to judge by appearances and to believe nearly all the modern historians,
occupied a prominent place in it. They were, in fact, during his reign, numerous and active; from the year 776
to the year 813 we may count thirty-five of these national assemblies, March-parades and May-parades, held
There is extant, touching this subject, a very curious document. A contemporary and counsellor of
Charlemagne, his cousin-german Adalbert, abbot of Corbic, had written a treatise entitled Of the Ordering of
the Palace (De Ordine Palatii), and designed to give an insight into the government of Charlemagne, with
especial reference to the national assemblies. This treatise was lost; but towards the close of the ninth century,
Hincmar, the celebrated archbishop of Rheims, reproduced it almost in its entirety, in the form of a letter or of
instructions, written at the request of certain grandees of the kingdom who had asked counsel of him with
respect to the government of Carloman, one of the sons of Charles the Stutterer. We read therein,
"It was the custom at this time to hold two assemblies every year. . . In both, that they might not seem to have
been convoked without motive, there were submitted to the examination and deliberation of the grandees . . .
and by virtue of orders from the king, the fragments of law called capitula, which the king himself had drawn
up under the inspiration of God or the necessity for which had been made manifest to him in the intervals
between the meetings."
Two striking facts are to be gathered from these words: the first, that the majority of the members composing
these assemblies probably regarded as a burden the necessity for being present at them, since Charlemagne
took care to explain their convocation by declaring to them the motive for it and by always giving them
something to do; the second, that the proposal of the capitularies, or, in modern phrase, the initiative,
proceeded from the emperor. The initiative is naturally exercised by him who wishes to regulate or reform,
and in his time it was especially Charlemagne who conceived this design. There is no doubt, however, but that
the members of the assembly might make on their side such proposals as appeared to them suitable; the
constitutional distrusts and artifices of our times were assuredly unknown to Charlemagne, who saw in these
assemblies a means of government rather than a barrier to his authority. To resume the text of
Hincmar:—
"After having received these communications, they deliberated on them two or three days or more, according
to the importance of the business. Palace-messengers, going and coming, took their questions and carried back
the answers. No stranger came near the place of their meeting until the result of their deliberations had been
able to be submitted to the scrutiny of the great prince, who then, with the wisdom he had received from God,
adopted a resolution which all obeyed."
The definitive resolution, therefore, depended upon Charlemagne alone; the assembly contributed only
information and counsel.
Hinemar continues, and supplies details worthy of reproduction, for they give an insight into the imperial
government and the action of Charlemagne himself amidst those most ancient of the national assemblies.
"Things went on thus for one or two capitularies, or a greater number, until, with God's help, all the
necessities of the occasion were regulated.
"Whilst these matters were thus proceeding out of the king's presence, the prince himself, in the midst of the
multitude, came to the general assembly, was occupied in receiving the presents, saluting the men of most
note, conversing with those he saw seldom, showing towards the elders a tender interest, disporting himself
with the youngsters, and doing the same thing, or something like it, with the ecclesiastics as well as the
seculars. However, if those who were deliberating about the matter submitted to their examination showed a
"The second business of the king was to ask of each what there was to report to him, or enlighten him
touching the part of the kingdom each had come from. Not only was this permitted to all, but they were
strictly enjoined to make inquiries, during the interval between the assemblies, about what happened within or
without the kingdom; and they were bound to seek knowledge from foreigners as well as natives, enemies as
well as friends, sometimes by employing emissaries, and without troubling themselves much about the
manner in which they acquired their information. The king wished to know whether in any part, in any corner
of the kingdom, the people were restless, and what was the cause of their restlessness; or whether there had
There is need of no great reflection to recognize the true character of these assemblies: it is clearly imprinted
upon the sketch drawn by Hincmar. The figure of Charlemagne alone fills the picture: he is the centre-piece of
it and the soul of everything. 'Tis he who wills that the national assemblies should meet and deliberate; 'tis he
who inquires into the state of the country; 'tis he who proposes and approves of or rejects the laws; with him
rest will and motive, initiative and decision. He has a mind sufficiently judicious, unshackled, and elevated to
understand that the nation ought not to be left in darkness about its affairs, and that he himself has need of
communicating with it, of gathering information from it, and of learning its opinions. But we have here no
exhibition of great political liberties, no people discussing its interests and its business, interfering effectually
in the adoption of resolutions, and, in fact, taking in its government so active and decisive a part as to have a
right to say that it is self-governing, or, in other words, a free people. It is Charlemagne, and he alone, who
governs; it is absolute government marked by prudence, ability, and grandeur.
When the mind dwells upon the state of Gallo-Frankish society in the eighth century, there is nothing
astonishing in such a fact. Whether it be civilized or barbarian, that which every society needs, that which it
seeks and demands first of all in its government, is a certain degree of good sense and strong will, of
intelligence and innate influence, so far as the public interests are concerned; qualities, in fact, which suffice
to keep social order maintained or make it realized, and to promote respect for individual rights and the
progress of the general well-being. This is the essential aim of every community of men; and the institutions
and guarantees of free government are the means of attaining it. It is clear that, in the eighth century, on the
ruins of the Roman and beneath the blows of the barbaric world, the Gallo-Frankish nation, vast and without
cohesion, brutish and ignorant, was incapable of bringing forth, so to speak, from its own womb, with the aid
of its own wisdom and virtue, a government of the kind. A host of different forces, without enlightenment and
without restraint, were everywhere and incessantly struggling for dominion, or, in other words, were ever
troubling and endangering the social condition. Let there but arise, in the midst of this chaos of unruly forces
and selfish passions, a great man, one of those elevated minds and strong characters that can understand the
essential aim of society and then urge it forward, and at the same time keep it well in hand on the roads that
lead thereto, and such a man will soon seize and exercise the personal power almost of a despot, and people
will not only make him welcome, but even celebrate his praises, for they do not quit the substance for the
shadow, or sacrifice the end to the means. Such was the empire of Charlemagne. Amongst annalists and
historians, some, treating him as a mere conqueror and despot, have ignored his merits and his glory; others,
that they might admire him without scruple, have made of him a founder of free institutions, a constitutional
monarch. Both are equally mistaken. Charlemagne was, indeed, a conqueror and a despot; but by his
conquests and his personal power he, so long as he was by, that is, for six and forty years, saved
Gallo-Frankish society from barbaric invasion without and anarchy within. That is the characteristic of his
government and his title to glory.
What he was in his wars and his general relations with his nation has just been seen; he shall now be exhibited
in all his administrative activity and his intellectual life, as a legislator and as a friend to the human mind. The
same man will be recognized in every ease; he will grow in greatness, without changing, as he appears under
his various aspects.
There are often joined together, under the title of Capitularies (capitula, small chapters, articles) a mass of
Acts, very different in point of dates and objects, which are attributed indiscriminately to Charlemagne. This
is a mistake. The Capitularies are the laws or legislative measures of the Frankish kings, Merovingian as well
as Carlovingian. Those of the Merovingians are few in number and of slight importance, and amongst those of
"Covetousness doth consist in desiring that which others possess, and in giving away nought of that which
one's self possesseth; according to the Apostle it is the root of all evil."
And,—
The Capitularies which have been classed under the heads of political, penal, and canonical legislation are the
most numerous, and are those which bear most decidedly an imperative or prohibitive stamp; amongst them a
prominent place is held by measures of political economy, administration, and police; you will find therein an
attempt to put a fixed price on provisions, a real trial of a maximum for cereals, and a prohibition of
mendicity, with the following clause:—
"If such mendicants be met with, and they labor not with their hands, let none take thought about giving unto
them."
The interior police of the palace was regulated thereby, as well as that of the empire:
"We do will and decree that none of those who serve in our palace shall take leave to receive therein any man
who seeketh refuge there and cometh to hide there, by reason of theft, homicide, adultery, or any other crime.
That if any free man do break through our interdicts, and hide such malefactor in our palace, he shall be bound
to carry him on his shoulders to the public quarter, and be there tied to the same stake as the malefactor."
Certain Capitularies have been termed religious legislation in contradistinction to canonical legislation,
because they are really admonitions, religious exhortations, addressed not to ecclesiastics alone, but to the
faithful, the Christian people in general, and notably characterized by good sense, and, one might almost say,
freedom of thought.
For example,
"Beware of venerating the names of martyrs falsely so called, and the memory of dubious saints."
"Let none suppose that prayer cannot be made to God save in three tongues [probably Latin, Greek, and
Germanic, or perhaps the vulgar tongue; for the last was really beginning to take form], for God is adored in
all tongues, and man is heard if he do but ask for the things that be right."
These details are put forward that a proper idea may be obtained of Charlemagne as a legislator, and of what
are called his laws. We have here, it will be seen, no ordinary legislator and no ordinary laws: we see the
work, with infinite variations and in disconnected form, of a prodigiously energetic and watchful master, who
had to think and provide for everything, who had to be everywhere the moving and the regulating spirit. This
universal and untiring energy is the grand characteristic of Charlemagne's government, and was, perhaps,
what made his superiority most incontestable and his power most efficient.
It is noticeable that the majority of Charlemagne's Capitularies belong to that epoch of his reign when he was
Emperor of the West, when he was invested with all the splendor of sovereign power. Of the sixty-five
Capitularies classed under different heads, thirteen only are previous to the 25th of December, 800, the date of
his coronation as emperor at Rome; fifty-two are comprised between the years 801 and 804.
The energy of Charlemagne as a warrior and a politician having thus been exhibited, it remains to say a few
words about his intellectual energy. For that is by no means the least original or least grand feature of his
character and his influence.
Modern times and civilized society have more than once seen despotic sovereigns filled with distrust towards
scholars of exalted intellect, especially such as cultivated the moral and political sciences, and little inclined to
admit them to their favor or to public office. There is no knowing whether, in our days, with our freedom of
thought and of the press, Charlemagne would have been a stranger to this feeling of antipathy; but what is
certain is, that in his day, in the midst of a barbaric society, there was no inducement to it, and that, by nature,
he was not disposed to it. His power was not in any respect questioned; distinguished intellects were very rare;
Charlemagne had too much need of their services to fear their criticisms, and they, on their part, were more
anxious to second his efforts than to show towards him anything like exaction or independence. He gave rein,
therefore, without any embarrassment or misgiving, to his spontaneous inclination towards them, their studies,
their labors, and their influence. He drew them into the management of affairs. In Guizot's History of
Civilization in France there is a list of the names and works of twenty-three men of the eighth and ninth
centuries who have escaped oblivion, and they are all found grouped about Charlemagne as his own habitual
advisers, or assigned by him as advisers to his sons Pepin and Louis in Italy and Aquitania, or sent by him to
all points of his empire as his commissioners (missi dominici), or charged in his name with important
negotiations. And those whom he did not employ at a distance formed, in his immediate neighborhood, a
learned and industrious society, a school of the palace, according to some modern commentators, but an
academy, and not a school, according to others, devoted rather to conversation than to teaching. It probably
fulfilled both missions; it attended Charlemagne at his various residences, at one time working for him at
questions he invited them to deal with, at another giving to the regular components of his court, to his children
and to himself, lessons in the different sciences called liberal, grammar, rhetoric, logic, astronomy, geometry,
and even theology and the great religious problems it was beginning to discuss.
Two men, Alcuin and Eginhard, have remained justly celebrated in the literary history of the age. Alcuin was
the principal director of the school of the palace, and the favorite, the confidant, the learned adviser of
It was without effort and by natural sympathy that Charlemagne had inspired them with such sentiments; for
he, too, really loved sciences, literature, and such studies as were then possible, and he cultivated them on his
own account and for his own pleasure, as a sort of conquest. It has been doubted whether he could write, and
an expression of Eginhard's might authorize such a doubt; but, according to other evidence and even
according to the passage in Eginhard, one is inclined to believe merely that Charlemagne strove painfully, and
without much success, to write a good hand. He had learned Latin, and he understood Greek. He caused to be
commenced, and, perhaps, himself commenced the drawing up of the first Germanic grammar. He ordered
that the old barbaric poems, in which the deeds and wars of the ancient kings were celebrated, should be
collected for posterity. He gave Germanic names to the twelve months of the year. He distinguished the winds
by twelve special terms, whereas before his time they had but four designations. He paid great attention to
astronomy. Being troubled one day at no longer seeing in the firmament one of the known planets, he wrote to
Alcuin, "What thinkest thou of this Mars, which, last year, being concealed in the sign of Cancer, was
intercepted from the sight of men by the light of the sun? Is it the regular course of his revolution? Is it the
influence of the sun? Is it a miracle? Could he have been two years about performing the course of a single
one?" In theological studies and discussions he exhibited a particular and grave interest. "It is to him," say
M.M. Ampere and Haureau, "that we must refer the honor of the decision taken in 794 by the Council of
Frankfort in the great dispute about images; a temperate decision which is as far removed from the infatuation
of the image-worshippers as from the frenzy of the image-breakers." And at the same time that he thus took
part in the great ecclesiastical questions, Charlemagne paid zealous attention to the instruction of the clergy,
whose ignorance he deplored. "Ah," said he one day, "if only I had about me a dozen clerics learned in all the
sciences, as Jerome and Augustin were!" With all his puissance it was not in his power to make Jeromes and
Augustins; but he laid the foundation, in the cathedral churches and the great monasteries, of episcopal and
cloistral schools for the education of ecclesiastics, and carrying his solicitude still farther, he recommended to
the bishops and abbots that, in those schools, "they should take care to make no difference between the sons of
serfs and of free men, so that they might come and sit on the same benches to study grammar, music, and
arithmetic." (Capitularies of 789, art. 70.) Thus, in the eighth century, he foreshadowed the extension which,
in the nineteenth, was to be accorded to primary instruction, to the advantage and honor not only of the clergy,
but also of the whole people.
After so much of war and toil at a distance, Charlemagne was now at Aix- la-Chapelle, finding rest in this
work of peaceful civilization. He was embellishing the capital which he had founded, and which was called
the king's court. He had built there a grand basilica, magnificently adorned. He was completing his own
palace there. He fetched from Italy clerics skilled in church music, a pious joyance to which he was much
devoted, and which he recommended to the bishops of his empire. In the outskirts of Aix-la-Chapelle "he gave
full scope," said Eginhard, "to his delight in riding and hunting. Baths of naturally-tepid water gave him great
Having thus carefully regulated his own private affairs and bounty, he, two years later, in 813, took the
measures necessary for the regulation, after his death, of public affairs. He had lost, in 811, his eldest son
Charles, who had been his constant companion in his wars, and, in 810, his second son Pepin, whom he had
made king of Italy; and he summoned to his side his third son Louis, king of Aquitaine, who was destined to
succeed him. He ordered the convocation of five local councils which were to assemble at Mayence, Rheims,
Chalons, Tours, and Arles, for the purpose of bringing about, subject to the king's ratification, the reforms
necessary in the Church. Passing from the affairs of the Church to those of the State, he convoked at
Aix-la-Chapelle a general assembly of bishops, abbots, counts, laic grandees, and of the entire people, and,
holding council in his palace with the chief amongst them, "he invited them to make his son Louis
king-emperor; whereto all assented, saying that it was very expedient, and pleasing, also, to the people. On
Sunday in the next month, August 813, Charlemagne repaired, crown on head, with his son Louis, to the
cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle, laid upon the altar another crown, and, after praying, addressed to his son a
solemn exhortation respecting all his duties as king towards God and the Church, towards his family and his
people, asked him if he were fully resolved to fulfil them, and, at the answer that he was, bade him take the
crown that lay upon the altar, and place it with his own hands upon his head, which Louis did amidst the
acclamations of all present, who cried, 'Long live the emperor Louis!' Charlemagne then declared his son
emperor jointly with him, and ended the solemnity with these words: 'Blessed be Thou, O Lord God, who hast
granted me grace to see with mine own eyes my son seated on my throne!'" And Louis set out again
immediately for Aquitaine.
He was never to see his father again. Charlemagne, after his son's departure, went out hunting, according to
his custom, in the forest of Ardenne, and continued during the whole autumn his usual mode of life. "But in
January, 814, he was taken ill," says Eginhard, "of a violent fever, which kept him to his bed. Recurring
forthwith to the remedy he ordinarily employed against fever, he abstained from all nourishment, persuaded
that this diet would suffice to drive away or at the least assuage the malady; but added to the fever came that
pain in the side which the Greeks call pleurisy; nevertheless the emperor persisted in his abstinence,
supporting his body only by drinks taken at long intervals; and on the seventh day after that he had taken to
his bed, having received the holy communion," he expired about nine A.M., on Saturday, the 28th of January,
814, in his seventy-first year.
If we sum up his designs and his achievements, we find an admirably sound idea and a vain dream, a great
success and a great failure.
Charlemagne took in hand the work of placing upon a solid foundation the Frankish-Christian dominion by
stopping, in the north and south, the flood of barbarians and Arabs—Paganism and Islamism. In that he
succeeded: the inundations of Asiatic populations spent their force in vain against the Gallic frontier. Western
and Christian Europe was placed, territorially, beyond reach of attacks from the foreigner and infidel. No
sovereign, no human being, perhaps, ever rendered greater service to the civilization of the world.
Charlemagne formed another conception and made another attempt. Like more than one great barbaric
warrior, he admired the Roman empire that had fallen, its vastness all in one, and its powerful organization
under the hand of a single master. He thought he could resuscitate it, durably, through the victory of a new
people and a new faith, by the hand of Franks and Christians. With this view he labored to conquer, convert,
and govern. He tried to be, at one and the same time, Caesar, Augustus, and Constantine. And for a moment
he appeared to have succeeded; but the appearance passed away with himself. The unity of the empire and the
absolute power of the emperor were buried in his grave. The Christian religion and human liberty set to work
to prepare for Europe other governments and other destinies.
Great men do great things which would not get done without them; they set their mark plainly upon history,
which realizes a portion of their ideas and wishes; but they are far from doing all they meditate, and they
know not all they do. They are at one and the same time instruments and free agents in a general design which
is infinitely above their ken, and which, even if a glimpse of it be caught, remains inscrutable to them—
the design of God towards mankind. When great men understand that such is their position and accept it, they
show sense, and they work to some purpose. When they do not recognize the limits of their free agency, and
the veil which hides from their eyes the future they are laboring for, they become the dupes, and frequently
the victims, of a blind pride, which events, in the long run, always end by exposing and punishing.
Amongst men of his rank, Charlemagne has had this singular good fortune, that his error, his misguided
attempt at imperialism, perished with him, whilst his salutary achievement, the territorial security of Christian
Europe, has been durable, to the great honor, as well as great profit, of European civilization.
CHAPTER XII.
The fate of those two facts is the very history of France under the Carlovingian dynasty; it is the only portion
of the events of that epoch which still deserves attention nowadays, for it is the only one which has exercised
any great and lasting influence on the general history of France.
Attempts at foreign invasion of France were renewed very often, and in many parts of Gallo-Frankish
territory, during the whole duration of the Carlovingian dynasty, and, even though they failed, they caused the
population of the kingdom to suffer from cruel ravages. Charlemagne, even after his successes against the
different barbaric invaders, had foreseen the evils which would be inflicted on France by the most formidable
and most determined of them, the Northmen, coming by sea, and landing on the coast. The most closely
contemporaneous and most given to detail of his chroniclers, the monk of St. Gall, tells in prolix and
pompous, but evidently heartfelt and sincere terms, the tale of the great emperor's far-sightedness. "Charles,
who was ever astir," says he, "arrived by mere hap and unexpectedly, in a certain town of Narbonnese Gaul.
Whilst he was at dinner, and was as yet unrecognized of any, some corsairs of the Northmen came to ply their
piracies in the very port. When their vessels were descried, they were supposed to be Jewish traders according
to some, African according to others, and British in the opinion of others; but the gifted monarch, perceiving,
by the build and lightness of the craft, that they bare not merchandise, but foes, said to his own folk, 'These
vessels be not laden with merchandise, but manned with cruel foes.' At these words all the Franks, in rivalry
one with another, run to their ships, but uselessly: for the Northmen, indeed, hearing that yonder was he whom
it was still their wont to call Charles the Hammer, feared lest all their fleet should be taken or destroyed in the
port, and they avoided, by a flight of inconceivable rapidity, not only the glaives, but even the eyes of those
who were pursuing then.
"Pious Charles, however, a prey to well-grounded fear, rose up from table, stationed himself at a window
looking eastward, and there remained a long while, and his eyes were filled with tears. As none durst question
him, this warlike prince explained to the grandees who were about his person the cause of his movement and
of his tears: 'Know ye, my lieges, wherefore I weep so bitterly? Of a surety I fear not lest these fellows should
succeed in injuring me by their miserable piracies; but it grieveth me deeply that, whilst I live, they should
have been nigh to touching at this shore, and I am a prey to violent sorrow when I foresee what evils they will
heap upon my descendants and their people.'"
It were tedious to relate or even to enumerate all these incursions of the Northmen, with their monotonous
incidents. When their frequency and their general character have been notified, all has been done that is due to
them from history. However, there are three on which it may be worth while to dwell particularly, by reason
of their grave historical consequences, as well as of the dramatic details which have been transmitted to us
about them.
In the middle and during the last half of the ninth century, a chief of the Northmen, named Hastenc or
Hastings, appeared several times over on the coasts and in the rivers of France, with numerous vessels and a
following. He had also with him, say the chronicles, a young Norwegian or Danish prince, Bieern, called
Ironsides, whom he had educated, and who had preferred sharing the fortunes of his governor to living quietly
with the king, his father. After several expeditions into Western France, Hastings became the theme of
terrible, and very probably fabulous stories. He extended his cruises, they say, to the Mediterranean, and,
having arrived at the coasts of Tuscany, within sight of a city which in his ignorance he took for Rome, he
resolved to pillage it; but, not feeling strong enough to attack it by assault, he sent to the bishop to say he was
very ill, felt a wish to become a Christian, and begged to be baptized. Some days afterwards, his comrades
spread a report that he was dead, and claimed for him the honors of a solemn burial. The bishop consented;
the coffin of Hastings was carried into the church, attended by a large number of his followers, without visible
Whether they were true or false, these rumors of bold artifices and distant expeditions on the part of Hastings
aggravated the dismay inspired by his appearance. He penetrated into the interior of the country in Poitou,
Anjou, Brittany, and along the Seine; pillaged the monasteries of Jumieges, St. Vaudrille, and St. Evroul; took
possession of Chartres, and appeared before Paris, where Charles the Bald, intrenched at St. Denis, was
deliberating with his prelates and barons as to how he might resist the Northmen or treat with them. The
chronicle says that the barons advised resistance, but that the king preferred negotiation, and "sent the Abbot
of St. Denis, the which was an exceeding wise man," to Hastings, who, "after long parley, and by reason of
large gifts and promises," consented to stop his cruisings, to become a Christian, and to settle in the count-ship
of Chartres, "which the king gave him as an hereditary possession, with all its appurtenances." According to
other accounts, it was only some years later, under the young king Louis III., grandson of Charles the Bald,
that Hastings was induced, either by reverses or by payment of money, to cease from his piracies, and accept
in recompense the countship of Chartres. Whatever may have been the date, he was, it is believed, the first
chieftain of the Northmen who renounced a life of adventure and plunder, to become, in France, a great
landed proprietor and a count of the king's. Prince Bieern then separated from his governor, and put again to
sea, "laden with so rich a booty that he could never feel any want of wealth; but a tempest swallowed up a
great part of his fleet, and cast him upon the coasts of Friesland, where he died soon after, for which Hastings
was exceeding sorry."
A greater chieftain of the Northmen than Hastings was soon to follow his example, and found Normandy in
France; but before Rolf, that is, Rollo, came and gave the name of his race to a French province, the piratical.
Northmen were again to attempt a greater blow against France, and to suffer a great reverse.
In November, 885, under the reign of Charles the Fat, after having, for more than forty years, irregularly
ravaged France, they resolved to unite their forces in order at length to obtain possession of Paris, whose
outskirts they had so often pillaged without having been able to enter the heart of the place, in the Ile de la
Cite, which had originally been and still was the real Paris. Two bodies of troops were set in motion; one,
under the command of Rollo, who was already famous amongst his comrades, marched on Rouen; the other
went right up the course of the Seine, under the orders of Siegfried, whom the Northmen called their king.
Rollo took Rouen, and pushed on at once for Paris. Duke Renaud, general of the Gallo-Frankish troops, went
to encounter him on the banks of the Eure, and sent to him, to sound his intentions, Hastings, the newly-made
count of Chartres. "Valiant warriors," said Hastings to Rollo, "whence come ye? What seek ye here? What is
the name of your lord and master? Tell us this; for we be sent unto you by the king of the Franks." "We be
Danes," answered Rollo, "and all be equally masters amongst us. We be come to drive out the inhabitants of
this land, and to subject it as our own country. But who art thou, thou who speakest so glibly?" "Ye have
sometime heard tell of one Hastings, who, issuing forth from amongst you, came hither with much shipping
and made desert a great part of the kingdom of the Franks?" "Yes," said Rollo, "we have heard tell of him;
Hastings began well and ended ill." "Will ye yield you to King Charles?" asked Hastings. "We yield," was the
answer, "to none; all that we shall take by our arms we will keep as our right. Go and tell this, if thou wilt, to
the king, whose envoy thou boastest to be." Hastings returned to the Gallo-Frankish army, and Rollo prepared
to march on Paris. Hastings had gone back somewhat troubled in mind. Now there was amongst the Franks
one Count Tetbold (Thibault), who greatly coveted the countship of Chartres, and he said to Hastings, "Why
slumberest thou softly? Knowest thou not that King Charles doth purpose thy death by cause of all the
Christian blood that thou didst aforetime unjustly shed? Bethink thee of all the evil thou hast done him, by
reason whereof he purposeth to drive thee from his land. Take heed to thyself that thou be not smitten
unawares." Hastings, dismayed, at once sold to Tetbold the town of Chartres, and, removing all that belonged
to him, departed to go and resume, for all that appears, his old course of life.
On the 25th of November, 885, all the forces of the North-men formed a junction before Paris; seven hundred
huge barks covered two leagues of the Seine, bringing, it is said, more than thirty thousand men. The
chieftains were astonished at sight of the new fortifications of the city, a double wall of circumvallation, the
bridges crowned with towers, and in the environs the ramparts of the abbeys of St. Denis and St. Germain
solidly rebuilt. Siegfried hesitated to attack a town so well defended. He demanded to enter alone and have an
interview with the bishop, Gozlin. "Take pity on thyself and thy flock," said he to him; "let us but pass
through this city; we will in no wise touch the town; we will do our best to preserve for thee and Count Eudes,
all your possessions." "This city," replied the bishop, "hath been confided unto us by the Emperor Charles,
king and ruler, under God, of the powers of the earth. He hath confided it unto us not that it should cause the
ruin but the salvation of the kingdom. If peradventure these walls had been confided to thy keeping, as they
have been to mine, wouldst thou do as thou biddest me?" "If ever I do so," answered Siegfried, "may my head
be condemned to fall by the sword and serve as food to the dogs! But if thou yield not to our prayers, so soon
as the sun shall commence his course, our armies will launch upon thee their poisoned arrows; and when the
sun shall end his course, they will give thee over to all the horrors of famine; and this will they do from year
to year." The bishop, however, persisted, without further discussion; being as certain of Count Eudes as he
The siege lasted thirteen months, whiles pushed vigorously forward with eight several assaults, whiles
maintained by close investment, and with all the alternations of success and reverse, all the intermixture of
brilliant daring and obscure sufferings, that can occur when the assailants are determined and the defenders
Some months afterwards, in 887, Charles the Fat was deposed, at a diet held on the banks of the Rhine, by the
grandees of Germanic France; and Arnulf, a natural son of Carloman, the brother of Louis III., was
proclaimed emperor in his stead. At the same time Count Eudes, the gallant defender of Paris, was elected
king at Compiegne and crowned by the Archbishop of Sens. Guy, duke of Spoleto, descended from
Charlemagne in the female line, hastened to France and was declared king at Langres by the bishop of that
town, but returned with precipitation to Italy, seeing no chance of maintaining himself in his French kingship.
Elsewhere, Boso, duke of Arles, became king of Provence, and the Burgundian Count Rodolph had himself
crowned at St. Maurice, in the Valais, king of transjuran Burgundy. There was still in France a legitimate
Carlovingian, a son of Louis the Stutterer, who was hereafter to become Charles the Simple; but being only a
child, he had been rejected or completely forgotten, and, in the interval that was to elapse ere his time should
arrive, kings were being made in all directions.
In the midst of this confusion, the Northmen, though they kept at a distance from Paris, pursued in Western
France their cruising and plundering. In Rollo they had a chieftain far superior to his vagabond predecessors.
The dignity of Charles the Simple had no reason to be well satisfied; but the great political question which, a
century before, caused Charlemagne such lively anxiety, was solved; the most dangerous, the most incessantly
renewed of all foreign invasions, those of the Northmen, ceased to threaten France. The vagabond pirates had
a country to cultivate and defend; the Northmen were becoming French.
No such transformation was near taking place in the case of the invasions of the Saracens in Southern Gaul;
they continued to infest Aquitania, Septimania, and Provence; their robber-hordes appeared frequently on the
coasts of the Mediterranean and the banks of the Rhone, at Aigues-Mortes, at Marseilles, at Arles, and in
A new people, the Hungarians, which was the only name then given to the Magyars, appeared at this epoch,
for the first time, amongst the devastators of Western Europe. From 910 to 954, as a consequence of
movements and wars on the Danube, Hungarian hordes, after scouring Central Germany, penetrated into
Alsace, Lorraine, Champagne, Burgundy, Berry, Dauphine, Provence, and even Aquitaine; but this inundation
was transitory, and if the populations of those countries had much to suffer from it, the Gallo-Frankish
dominion, in spite of inward disorder and the feebleness of the latter Carlovingians, was not seriously
endangered thereby.
And so the first of Charlemagne's grand designs, the territorial security of the Gallo-Frankish and Christian
dominion, was accomplished. In the east and the north, the Germanic and Asiatic populations, which had so
long upset it, were partly arrested at its frontiers, partly incorporated regularly in its midst. In the south, the
Mussulman populations which, in the eighth century, had appeared so near overwhelming it, were powerless
to deal it any heavy blow. Substantially France was founded. But what had become of Charlemagne's second
grand design, the resuscitation of the Roman empire at the hands of the barbarians that had conquered it and
become Christians?
Let us leave Louis the Debonnair his traditional name, although it is not an exact rendering of that which was
given him by his contemporaries. They called him Louis the Pious. And so indeed he was, sincerely and even
scrupulously pious; but he was still more weak than pious, as weak in heart and character as in mind, as
destitute of ruling ideas as of strength of will; fluctuating at the mercy of transitory impressions, or
surrounding influences, or positional embarrassments. The name of Debonnair is suited to him; it expresses
his moral worth and his political incapacity, both at once.
As king of Aquitania, in the time of Charlemagne, Louis made himself esteemed and loved; his justice, his
suavity, his probity, and his piety were pleasing to the people, and his weaknesses disappeared under the
strong hand of his father. When he became emperor, he began his reign by a reaction against the excesses, real
or supposed, of the preceding reign. Charlemagne's morals were far from regular, and he troubled himself but
little about the license prevailing in his family or his palace. At a distance he ruled with a tight and a heavy
Almost simultaneously with his accession, Louis committed an act more serious and compromising. He had,
by his wife Hermengarde, three sons, Lothaire, Pepin, and Louis, aged respectively nineteen, eleven, and
eight. In 817 Louis summoned at Aix-la-Chapelle the general assembly of his dominions; and there, whilst
declaring that "neither to those who were wisely-minded, nor to himself, did it appear expedient to break up,
for the love he bare his sons and by the will of man, the unity of the empire, preserved by God himself," he
had resolved to share with his eldest son, Lothaire, the imperial throne. Lothaire was in fact crowned emperor;
and his two brothers, Pepin and Louis, were crowned king, "in order that they might reign, after their father's
death and under their brother and lord, Lothaire, to wit: Pepin, over Aquitaine and a great part of Southern
Gaul and of Burgundy; Louis, beyond the Rhine, over Bavaria and the divers peoplets in the east of
Germany." The rest of Gaul and of Germany, as well as the kingdom of Italy, was to belong to Lothaire,
emperor and head of the Frankish monarchy, to whom his brothers would have to repair year by year to come
to an understanding with him and receive his instructions. The last-named kingdom, the most considerable of
the three, remained under the direct government of Louis the Debonnair, and at the same time of his son
Lothaire, sharing the title of emperor. The two other sons, Pepin and Louis, entered, notwithstanding their
childhood, upon immediate possession, the one of Aquitaine and the other of Bavaria, under the superior
authority of their father and their brother, the joint emperors.
Charlemagne had vigorously maintained the unity of the empire, for all that he had delegated to two of his
sons, Pepin and Louis, the government of Italy and Aquitaine, with the title of king. Louis the Debonnair,
whilst regulating beforehand the division of his dominion, likewise desired, as he said, to maintain the unity
of the empire. But he forgot that he was no Charlemagne.
It was not long before numerous mournful experiences showed to what extent the unity of the empire required
personal superiority in the emperor, and how rapid would be the decay of the fabric when there remained
nothing but the title of the founder.
In 816 Pope Stephen IV. came to France to consecrate Louis the Debonnair emperor. Many a time already the
Popes had rendered the Frankish kings this service and honor. The Franks had been proud to see their king,
Charlemagne, protecting Adrian I. against the Lombards; then crowned emperor at Rome by Leo III., and then
having his two sons, Pepin and Louis, crowned at Rome, by the same Pope, kings respectively of Italy and of
Aquitaine. On these different occasions, Charlemagne, whilst testifying the most profound respect for the
Pope, had, in his relations with him, always taken care to preserve, together with his political greatness, all his
personal dignity. But when, in 816, the Franks saw Louis the Pious not only go out of Rheims to meet Stephen
IV., but prostrate himself, from head to foot, and rise only when the Pope held out a hand to him, the
spectators felt saddened and humiliated at the sight of their emperor in the posture of a penitent monk.
Several insurrections burst out in the empire; the first amongst the Basques of Aquitaine; the next in Italy,
where Bernard, son of Pepin, having, after his father's death, become king in 812, with the consent of his
grandfather Charlemagne, could not quietly see his kingdom pass into the hands of his cousin Lothaire at the
orders of his uncle Louis. These two attempts were easily repressed, but the third was more serious. It took
place in Brittany, amongst those populations of Armorica who were still buried in their woods, and were
excessively jealous of their independence. In 818 they took for king one of their principal chieftains, named
Morvan; and, not confining themselves to a refusal of all tribute to the king of the Franks, they renewed their
ravages upon the Frankish territories bordering on their frontier. Louis was at that time holding a general
assembly of his dominions at Aix-la-Chapelle; and Count Lantbert, commandant of the marches of Brittany,
The monk returned to Louis the Debonnair, and rendered account of his mission. War was resolved upon; and
the emperor collected his troops, Allemannians, Saxons, Thuringians, Burgundians, and Aquitanians, without
counting Franks or Gallo-Romans. They began their march, moving upon Vannes; Louis was at their head,
and the empress accompanied him, but he left her, already ill and fatigued, at Angers. The Franks entered the
country of the Britons, searched the woods and morasses, found no armed men in the open country, but
encountered them in scattered and scanty companies, at the entrance of all the defiles, on the heights
commanding pathways, and wherever men could hide themselves and await the moment for appearing
unexpectedly. The Franks heard them, from amidst the heather and the brushwood, uttering shrill cries, to give
warning one to another, or to alarm the enemy. The Franks advanced cautiously, and at last arrived at the
entrance of the thick wood which surrounded Morvan's abode. He had not yet set out with the pick of the
warriors he had about him; but, at the approach of the Franks, he summoned his wife and his domestics, and
said to them, "Defend ye well this house and these woods; as for me, I am going to march forward to collect
my people; after which to return, but not without booty and spoils." He put on his armor, took a javelin in
each hand, and mounted his horse. "Thou seest," said he to his wife, "these javelins I brandish: I will bring
them back to thee this very day dyed with the blood of Franks. Farewell." Setting out he pierced, followed by
his men, through the thickness of the forest, and advanced to meet the Franks.
The battle began. The large numbers of the Franks, who covered the ground for some distance, dismayed the
Britons, and many of them fled, seeking where they might hide themselves. Morvan, beside himself with rage,
and at the head of his most devoted followers, rushed down upon the Franks as if to demolish them at a single
It spreads on all sides that Morvan is dead; and the Franks come thronging to the scene of the encounter.
There is picked up and passed from hand to hand a head all bloody and fearfully disfigured. Ditcar the monk
is called to see it, and to say whether it is that of Morvan; but he has to wash the mass of disfigurement, and to
partially adjust the hair, before he can pronounce that it is really Morvan's. There is then no more doubt;
resistance is now impossible; the widow, the family, and the servants of Morvan arrive, are brought before
Louis the Debonnair, accept all the conditions imposed upon them, and the Franks withdraw with the boast
that Brittany is henceforth their tributary. (Faits et testes de Louis le Picux, a poem by Ermold le Noir, in M.
Guizot's Collection des Memoires relatifs L'Histoire de France, t. iv., p. 1-113.—Fauriel, Histoire de la
Gaule, etc., t. iv., p. 77-88.)
On arriving at Angers, Louis found the Empress Hermengarde dying; and two days afterwards she was dead.
He had a tender heart, which was not proof against sorrow; and he testified a desire to abdicate and turn monk.
Lothaire considered his father dethroned for good, and himself henceforth sole emperor; but he was mistaken.
For six years longer the scenes which have just been described kept repeating themselves again and again;
rivalries and secret plots began once more between the three victorious brothers and their partisans; popular
feeling revived in favor of Louis; a large portion of the clergy shared it; several counts of Neustria and
Burgundy appeared in arms in the name of the deposed emperor; and the seductive and able Judith came
afresh upon the scene, and gained over to the cause of her husband and her son a multitude of friends. In 834,
two assemblies, one meeting at St. Denis and the other at Thionville, annulled all the acts of the assembly of
Compiegne, and for the third time put Louis in possession of the imperial title and power. He displayed no
violence in his use of it; but he was growing more and more irresolute and weak, when, in 838, the second of
his rebellious sons, Pepin, king of Aquitaine, died suddenly. Louis, ever under the sway of Judith, speedily
convoked at Worms, in 839, once more and for the last time, a general assembly, whereat, leaving his son
Louis of Bavaria reduced to his kingdom in Eastern Europe, he divided the rest of his dominions into two
nearly equal parts, separated by the course of the Meuse and the Rhone. Between these two parts he left the
choice to Lothaire, who took the eastern portion, promising at the same time to guarantee the western portion
to his younger brother Charles. Louis the Germanic protested against this partition, and took up arms to resist
it. His father, the emperor, set himself in motion towards the Rhine, to reduce him to submission; but, on
arriving close to Mayence, he caught a violent fever, and died on the 20th of June, 840, at the castle of
Ingelheim, on a little island in the river. His last acts were a fresh proof of his goodness towards even his
rebellious sons, and of his solicitude for his last-born. He sent to Louis the Germanic his pardon, and to
Lothaire the golden crown and sword, at the same time bidding him fulfil his father's wishes on behalf of
Charles and Judith.
There is no telling whether, in the credulousness of his good nature, Louis had, at his dying hour, any great
confidence in the appeal he made to his son Lothaire, and in the impression which would be produced on his
other son, Louis of Bavaria, by the pardon bestowed. The prayers of the dying are of little avail against violent
passions and barbaric manners. Scarcely was Louis the Debonnair dead, when Lothaire was already
conspiring against young Charles, and was in secret alliance, for his despoilment, with Pepin II., the late king
of Aquitaine's son, who had taken up arms for the purpose of seizing his father's kingdom, in the possession of
which his grandfather Louis had not been pleased to confirm him. Charles suddenly learned that his mother
Judith was on the point of being besieged in Poitiers by the Aquitanians; and, in spite of the friendly
protestations sent to him by Lothaire, it was not long before he discovered the plot formed against him. He
was not wanting in shrewdness or energy; and, having first provided for his mother's safety, he set about
forming an alliance, in the cause of their common interests, with his other brother, Louis the Germanic, who
was equally in danger from the ambition of Lothaire. The historians of the period do not say what negotiator
was employed by Charles on this distant and delicate mission; but several circumstances indicate that the
Empress Judith herself undertook it; that she went in quest of the king of Bavaria; and that it was she who,
with her accustomed grace and address, determined him to make common cause with his younger against their
eldest brother. Divers incidents retarded for a whole year the outburst of this family plot, and of the war of
which it was the precursor. The position of the young King Charles appeared for some time a very bad one;
but "certain chieftains," says the historian Nithard, "faithful to his mother and to him, and having nothing
more to lose than life or limb, chose rather to die gloriously than to betray their king." The arrival of Louis the
Germanic with his troops helped to swell the forces and increase the confidence of Charles; and it was on the
21st of June, 841, exactly a year after the death of Louis the Debonnair, that the two armies, that of Lothaire
and Pepin on the one side, and that of Charles the Bald and Louis the Germanic on the other, stood face to
face in the neighborhood of the village of Fontenailles, six leagues from Auxerre, on the rivulet of Audries.
In spite of this battle, which appeared a decisive one, Lothaire made zealous efforts to continue the struggle;
he scoured the countries wherein he hoped to find partisans: to the Saxons he promised the unrestricted
re-establishment of their pagan worship, and several of the Saxon tribes responded to his appeal. Louis the
Germanic and Charles the Bald, having information of these preliminaries, resolved to solemnly renew their
alliance; and, seven months after their victory at Fontenailles, in February, 842, they repaired both of them,
each with his army, to Argentaria, on the right bank of the Rhine, between Bale and Strasbourg, and there, at
an open-air meeting, Louis first, addressing the chieftains about him in the German tongue, said, "Ye all know
how often, since our father's death, Lothaire hath attacked us, in order to destroy us, this my brother and me.
Having never been able, as brothers and Christians, or in any just way, to obtain peace from him, we were
constrained to appeal to the judgment of God. Lothaire was beaten and retired, whither he could, with his
following; for we, restrained by paternal affection and moved with compassion for Christian people, were
unwilling to pursue them to extermination. Neither then nor aforetime did we demand ought else save that
each of us should be maintained in his rights. But he, rebelling against the judgment of God, ceaseth not to
attack us as enemies, this my brother and me; and he destroyeth our peoples with fire and pillage and the
sword. That is the cause which hath united us afresh; and, as we trove that ye doubt the soundness of our
alliance and our fraternal union, we have resolved to bind ourselves afresh by this oath in your presence, being
led thereto by no prompting of wicked covetousness, but only that we may secure our common advantage in
case that, by your aid, God should cause us to obtain peace. If, then, I violate—which God
forbid—this oath that I am about to take to my brother, I hold you all quit of submission to me and of
the faith ye have sworn to me."
Charles repeated this speech, word for word, to his own troops, in the Romance language, in that idiom
derived from a mixture of Latin and of the tongues of ancient Gaul, and spoken, thenceforth, with varieties of
dialect and pronunciation, in nearly all parts of Frankish Gaul. After this address, Louis pronounced and
Charles repeated after him, each in his own tongue, the oath couched in these terms: "For the love of God, for
the Christian people, and for our common weal, from this day forth and so long as God shall grant me power
and knowledge, I will defend this my brother, and will be an aid to him in everything, as one ought to defend
his brother, provided that he do likewise unto me; and I will never make with Lothaire any covenant which
may be, to my knowledge, to the damage of this my brother."
After four or five months of tentative measures or of incidents which taught both parties that they could not,
either of them, hope to completely destroy their opponents, the two allied brothers received at Verdun,
whither they had repaired to concert their next movement, a messenger from Lothaire, with peaceful proposals
which they were unwilling to reject. The principal was that, with the exception of Italy, Aquitaine, and
Bavaria, to be secured without dispute to their then possessors, the Frankish empire should be divided into
three portions, that the arbiters elected to preside over the partition should swear to make it as equal as
possible, and that Lothaire should have his choice, with the title of Emperor. About mid June, 842, the three
brothers met on an island of the Saone, near Chalons, where they began to discuss the questions which divided
them; but it was not till more than a year after, in August, 843, that assembling all three of them, with their
umpires, at Verdun, they at last came to an agreement about the partition of the Frankish empire, save the
three countries which it had been beforehand agreed to except. Louis kept all the provinces of Germany of
which he was already in possession, and received besides, on the left bank of the Rhine, the towns of
Mayence, Worms, and Spire, with the territory appertaining to them. Lothaire, for his part, had the eastern belt
of Gaul, bounded on one side by the Rhine and the Alps, on the other by the courses of the Meuse, the Saone,
and the Rhone, starting from the confluence of the two latter rivers, and, further, the country comprised
between the Meuse and the Scheldt, together with certain countships lying to the west of that river. To Charles
fell all the rest of Gaul: Vasconia or Biscaye, Septimania, the marches of Spain, beyond the Pyrenees, and the
other countries of Southern Gaul which had enjoyed hitherto, under the title of the Kingdom of Aquitaine, a
special government subordinated to the general government of the empire, but distinct from it, lost this last
remnant of their Gallo-Roman nationality, and became integral portions of Frankish Gaul, which fell by
partition to Charles the Bald, and formed one and the same kingdom under one and the same king.
Thus fell through and disappeared, in 843, by virtue of the treaty of Verdun, the second of Charlemagne's
grand designs, the resuscitation of the Roman empire by means of the Frankish and Christian masters of Gaul.
The name of emperor still retained a certain value in the minds of the people, and still remained an object of
ambition to princes; but the empire was completely abolished, and in its stead sprang up three kingdoms,
independent one of another, without any necessary connection or relation. One of the three was thenceforth
France.
In this great event are comprehended two facts; the disappearance of the empire and the formation of the three
kingdoms which took its place. The first is easily explained. The resuscitation of the Roman empire had been
a dream of ambition and ignorance on the part of a great man, but a barbarian. Political unity and central
absolute power had been the essential characteristics of that empire. They became introduced and established,
through a long succession of ages, on the ruins of the splendid Roman republic, destroyed by its own
dissensions, under favor of the still great influence of the old Roman senate, though fallen from its high estate,
and beneath the guardianship of the Roman legions and imperial pretorians. Not one of these conditions, not
As for the second fact, the formation of the three kingdoms which were the issue of the treaty of Verdun,
various explanations have been given of it. This distribution of certain peoples of Western Europe into three
distinct and independent groups, Italians, Germans, and French, has been attributed at one time to a diversity
of histories and manners; at another to geographical causes and to what is called the rule of natural frontiers;
and oftener still to a spirit of nationality and to differences of language. Let none of these causes be gainsaid;
they all exercised some sort of influence, but they are all incomplete in themselves and far too redolent of
theoretical system. It is true that Germany, France, and Italy began, at that time, to emerge from the chaos into
which they had been plunged by barbaric invasion and the conquests of Charlemagne, and to form themselves
into quite distinct nations; but there were in each of the kingdoms of Lothaire, of Louis the Germanic, and of
Charles the Bald, populations widely differing in race, language, manners, and geographical affinity, and it
required many great events and the lapse of many centuries to bring about the degree of national unity they
now possess. To say nothing touching the agency of individual and independent forces, which is always
considerable, although so many men of intellect ignore it in the present day, what would have happened, had
any one of the three new kings, Lothaire, or Louis the Germanic, or Charles the Bald, been a second
Charlemagne, as Charlemagne had been a second Charles Martel? Who can say that, in such a case, the three
kingdoms would have taken the form they took in 843?
Happily or unhappily, it was not so; none of Charlemagne's successors was capable of exercising on the
events of his time, by virtue of his brain and his own will, any notable influence. Not that they were all
unintelligent, or timid, or indolent. It has been seen that Louis the Debonnair did not lack virtues and good
intentions; and Charles the Bald was clear-sighted, dexterous, and energetic; he had a taste for information
and intellectual distinction; he liked and sheltered men of learning and letters, and to such purpose that,
instead of speaking, as under Charlemagne, of the school of the palace, people called the palace of Charles the
Bald the palace of the school. Amongst the eleven kings who after him ascended the Carlovingian throne,
several, such as Louis III. and Carloman, and, especially, Louis the Ultramarine (d'Outremer) and Lothaire,
displayed, on several occasions, energy and courage; and the kings elected, at this epoch, without the pale of
the Carlovingian dynasty—Eudes in 887 and Raoul in 923—gave proofs of a valor both discreet
and effectual. The Carlovingians did not, as the Merovingians did, end in monkish retirement or shameful
inactivity even the last of them, and the only one termed sluggard, Louis V., was getting ready, when he died,
for an expedition in Spain against the Saracens. The truth is that, mediocre or undecided or addle-pated as
they may have been, they all succumbed, internally and externally, without initiating and without resisting, to
the course of events, and that, in 987, the fall of the Carlovingian line was the natural and easily accomplished
consequence of the new social condition which had been preparing in France under the empire.
CHAPTER XIII.
We will leave where they are the three distinct and independent kingdoms, and turn our introspective gaze
upon the kingdom of France. There we recognize the same fact; there the same work of dismemberment is
going on. About the end of the ninth century there were already twenty-nine provinces or fragments of
provinces which had become petty states, the former governors of which, under the names of dukes, counts,
marquises, and viscounts, were pretty nearly real sovereigns. Twenty-nine great fiefs, which have played a
special part in French history, date back to this epoch.
These petty states were not all of equal importance or in possession of a perfectly similar independence; there
were certain ties uniting them to other states, resulting in certain reciprocal obligations which became the
basis, or, one might say, the constitution of the feudal community; but their prevailing feature was,
nevertheless, isolation, personal existence. They were really petty states begotten from the dismemberment of
a great territory; those local governments were formed at the expense of a central power.
From the end of the ninth pass we to the end of the tenth century, to the epoch when the Capetians take the
place of the Carlovingians. Instead of seven kingdoms to replace the empire of Charlemagne, there were then
no more than four. The kingdoms of Provence and Trans-juran Burgundy had formed, by re-union, the
kingdom of Arles. The kingdom of Lorraine was no more than a duchy in dispute between Allemannia and
France. The Emperor Otho the Great had united the kingdom of Italy to the empire of. Allemannia. Overtures
had produced their effects amongst the great states. But in the interior of the kingdom of France,
dismemberment had held on its course; and instead of the twenty-nine petty states or great fiefs observable at
the end of the ninth century, we find at the end of the tenth, fifty-five actually established. (Vide Guizot's
Histoire de la Civilisation, t. ii., pp. 238-246.)
Now, how was this ever-increasing dismemberment accomplished? What causes determined it, and little by
little made it the substitute for the unity of the empire? Two causes, perfectly natural and independent of all
human calculation, one moral and the other political. They were the absence from the minds of men of any
general and dominant idea; and the reflux, in social relations and manners, of the individual liberties but lately
repressed or regulated by the strong hand of Charlemagne. In times of formation or transition, states and
governments conform to the measure, one had almost said to the height, of the men of the period, their ideas,
The consequences of such a state of things and of such a disposition of persons were rapidly developed.
Territorial ownership became the fundamental characteristic of and warranty for independence and social
importance. Local sovereignty, if not complete and absolute, at least in respect of its principal rights, right of
making war, right of judicature, right of taxation, and right of regulating the police, became one with the
territorial ownership, which before long grew to be hereditary, whether, under the title of alleu (allodium), it
had been originally perfectly independent and exempt from any feudal tie, or, under the title of benefice, had
arisen from grants of land made by the chieftain to his followers, on condition of certain obligations. The
offices, that is, the divers functions, military or civil, conferred by the king on his lieges, also ended by
becoming hereditary. Having become established in fact, this heirship in lands and local powers was soon
recognized by the law. A capitulary of Charles the Bald, promulgated in 877, contains the two following
provisions:—
"If, after our death, any one of our lieges, moved by love for God and our person, desire to renounce the
world, and if he have a son or other relative capable of serving the public weal, let him be free to transmit to
him his benefices and his honor, according to his pleasure."
"If a count of this kingdom happen to die, and his son be about our person, we will that our son; together with
those of our lieges who may chance to be the nearest relatives of the deceased count, as well as with the other
officers of the said countship and the bishop of the diocese wherein it is situated, shall provide for its
administration until the death of the heretofore count shall have been announced to us and we have been
enabled to confer on the son, present at our court, the honors wherewith his father was invested."
Thus the king still retained the nominal right of conferring on the son the offices or local functions of the
father, but he recognized in the son the right to obtain them. A host of documents testify that at this epoch,
when, on the death of a governor of a province, the king attempted to give his countship to some one else than
his descendants, not only did personal interest resist, but such a measure was considered a violation of right.
Under the reign of Louis the Stutterer, son of Charles the Bald, two of his lieges, Wilhelm and Engelschalk,
held two countships on the confines of Bavaria; and, at their death, their offices were given to Count Arbo, to
the prejudice of their sons. "The children and their relatives," says the chronicler, "taking that as a gross
injustice, said that matters ought to go differently, and that they would die by the sword or Arbo should give
up the courtship of their family." Heirship in territorial ownerships and their local rights, whatever may have
originally been their character; heirship in local offices or powers, military or civil, primarily conferred by the
king; and, by consequence, hereditary union of territorial ownership and local government, under the
condition, a little confused and precarious, of subordinated relations and duties between suzerain and
vassal—such was, in law and in fact, the feudal order of things. From the ninth to the tenth century it
had acquired full force.
This order of things being thus well defined, we find ourselves face to face with an indisputable historic fact:
no period, no system has ever, in France, remained so odious to the public instincts. And this antipathy is not
peculiar to our age, nor merely the fruit of that great revolution which not long since separated, as by a gulf,
the French present from its past. Go back to any portion of French history, and stop where you will; and you
will everywhere find the feudal system considered, by the mass of the population, a foe to be fought and
fought down at any price. At all times, whoever dealt it a blow has been popular in France.
The reasons for this fact are not all, or even the chief of them, to be traced to the evils which, in France, the
people had to endure under the feudal system. It is not evil plight which is most detested and feared by
peoples; they have more than once borne, faced, and almost wooed it, and there are woful epochs, the memory
of which has remained dear. It is in the political character of feudalism, in the nature and shape of its power,
that we find lurking that element of popular aversion which, in France at least, it has never ceased to inspire.
It was a confederation of petty sovereigns, of petty despots, unequal amongst themselves, and having, one
towards another, certain duties and rights, but invested in their own domains, over their personal and direct
subjects, with arbitrary and absolute power. That is the essential element of the feudal system; therein it
differs from every other aristocracy, every other form of government.
There has been no scarcity in this world of aristocracies and despotisms. There have been peoples arbitrarily
governed, nay, absolutely possessed by a single man, by a college of priests, by a body of patricians. But none
of these despotic governments was like the feudal system.
In the case where the sovereign power has been placed in the hands of a single man, the condition of the
people has been servile and woful. At bottom the feudal system was somewhat better; and it will presently be
explained why. Meanwhile, it must be acknowledged that that condition often appeared less burdensome, and
obtained more easy acceptance than the feudal system. It was because, under the great absolute monarchies,
men did, nevertheless, obtain some sort of equality and tranquillity. A shameful equality and a fatal
tranquillity, no doubt; but such as peoples are sometimes contented with under the dominance of certain
circumstances, or in the last gasp of their existence. Liberty, equality, and tranquillity were all alike wanting,
from the tenth to the thirteenth century, to the inhabitants of each lord's domains; their sovereign was at their
very doors, and none of them was hidden from him, or beyond reach of his mighty arm. Of all tyrannies, the
worst is that which can thus keep account of its subjects, and which sees, from its seat, the limits of its empire.
The caprices of the human will then show themselves in all their intolerable extravagance, and, moreover,
with irresistible promptness. It is then, too, that inequality of conditions makes itself more rudely felt; riches,
might, independence, every advantage and every right present themselves every instant to the gaze of misery,
weakness, and servitude. The inhabitants of fiefs could not find consolation in the bosom of tranquillity;
incessantly mixed up in the quarrels of their lord, a prey to his neighbors' devastations, they led a life still
more precarious and still more restless than that of the lords themselves, and they had to put up at one and the
same time with the presence of war, privilege, and absolute power. Nor did the rule of feudalism differ less
from that of a college of priests or a senate of patricians than from the despotism of an individual. In the two
former systems we have an aristocratic body governing the mass of the people; in the feudal system we have
an aristocracy resolved into individuals, each of whom governs on his own private account a certain number
of persons dependent upon him alone. Be the aristocratic body a clergy, its power has its root in creeds which
are common to itself and its subjects. Now, in every creed common to those who command and those who
obey there is a moral tie, an element of sympathetic equality, and on the part of those who obey a tacit
adhesion to the rule. Be it a senate of patricians that reigns, it cannot govern so capriciously, so arbitrarily, as
an individual. There are differences and discussions in the very bosom of the government; there may be, nay,
Is it astonishing that such a system incurred, on the part of the peoples, more hatred than even those which had
reduced them to a more monotonous and more lasting servitude? There was despotism, just as in pure
monarchies, and there was privilege, just as in the very closest aristocracies. And both obtruded themselves in
the most offensive, and, so to speak, crude form. Despotism was not tapered off by means of the distant and
elevation of a throne; and privilege did not veil itself behind the majesty of a large body. Both were the
appurtenances of an individual ever present and ever alone, ever at his subjects' doors, and never called upon,
in dealing with their lot, to gather his peers around him.
And now we will leave the subjects in the case of feudalism, and consider the masters, the owners of fiefs, and
their relations one with another. We here behold quite a different spectacle; we see liberties, rights, and
guarantees, which not only give protection and honor to those who enjoy them, but of which the tendency and
effect are to open to the subject population an outlet towards a better future.
It could not, in fact, be otherwise: for, on the one hand, feudal society was not wanting in dignity and glory;
and, on the other, the feudal system did not, as the theocracy of Egypt or the despotism of Asia did, condemn
its subjects irretrievably to slavery. It oppressed them; but they ended by having the power as well as the will
to go free.
It is the fault of pure monarchy to set up power so high, and encompass it with such splendor, that the
possessor's head is turned, and that those who are beneath it dare scarcely look upon it. The sovereign thinks
himself a god; and the people fall down and worship him. But it was not so in society under owners of fiefs:
the grandeur was neither dazzling nor unapproachable; it was but a short step from vassal to suzerain; they
lived familiarly one with another, without any possibility that superiority should think itself illimitable, or
subordination think itself servile. Thence came that extension of the domestic circle, that ennoblement of
personal service, from which sprang one of the most generous sentiments of the middle ages, fealty, which
reconciled the dignity of the man with the devotion of the vassal.
Further, it was not from a numerous aristocratic senate, but from himself, and almost from himself alone, that
every possessor of fiefs derived his strength and his lustre. Isolated as he was in his domains, it was for him to
maintain himself therein, to extend them, to keep his subjects submissive and his vassals faithful, and to
correct those who were wanting in obedience to him, or who ignored their duties as members of the feudal
hierarchy. It was, as it were, a people consisting of scattered citizens, of whom each, ever armed,
accompanied by his following or intrenched in his castle, kept watch himself over his own safety and his own
rights, relying far more on his own courage and his own renown than on the protection of the public
authorities. Such a condition bears less resemblance to an organized and settled society than to a constant
prospect of peril and war; but the energy and the dignity of the individual were kept up in it, and a more
extended and better regulated society might issue therefrom.
And it did issue. This society of the future was not slow to sprout and grow in the midst of that feudal system
so turbulent, so oppressive, so detested. For five centuries, from the invasion of the barbarians to the fall of
the Carlovingians, France presents the appearance of being stationary in the middle of chaos. Over this long,
dark space of anarchy, feudalism is slowly taking shape, at the expense, at one time, of liberty, at another, of
order; not as a real rectification of the social condition, but as the only order of things which could possibly
From the end of the ninth to the end of the tenth century, two families were, in French history, the
representatives and instruments of the two systems thus confronted and conflicting at that epoch, the imperial
which was falling, and the feudal which was rising. After the death of Charlemagne, his descendants, to the
number of ten, from Louis the Debonnair to Louis the Sluggard, strove obstinately, but in vain, to maintain
the unity of the empire and the unity of the central power. In four generations, on the other hand, the
descendants of Robert the Strong climbed to the head of feudal France. The former, though German in race,
were imbued with the maxims, the traditions, and the pretensions of that Roman world which had been for a
while resuscitated by their glorious ancestor; and they claimed it as their heritage. The latter preserved, at their
settlement upon Gallo-Roman territory, Germanic sentiments, manners, and instincts, and were occupied only
with the idea of getting more and more settled, and greater and greater in the new society which was little by
little being formed upon the soil won by the barbarians, their forefathers. Louis the Ultra-marine and Lothaire
were not, we may suppose, less personally brave than Robert the Strong and his son Eudes; but when the
Northmen put the Frankish dominions in peril, it was not to the descendants of Charlemagne, not to the
emperor Charles the Fat, but to the local and feudal chieftain, to Eudes, count of Paris, that the population
turned for salvation: and Eudes it was who saved them.
In this painful parturition of French monarchy, one fact deserves to be remarked, and that is, the lasting
respect attached, in the minds of the people, to the name and the reminiscences of the Carlovingian rule,
notwithstanding its decay. It was not alone the lustre of that name, and of the memory of Charlemagne which
inspired and prolonged this respect; a certain instinctive feeling about the worth of hereditary monarchy, as an
element of stability and order, already existed amongst the populations, and glimpses thereof were visible
amongst the rivals of the royal family in the hour of its dissolution. It had been consecrated by religion; the
title of anointed of the Most High was united, in its case, to that of lawful heir. Why did Hugh the Great, duke
of France, in spite of favorable opportunities and very palpable temptations, abstain perseveringly from taking
the crown, and leave it tottering upon the heads of Louis the Ultramarine and Lothaire? Why did his son,
Hugh Capet himself, wait, for his election as king, until Louis the Sluggard was dead, and the Carlovingian
line had only a collateral and discredited representative? In these hesitations and lingerings of the great feudal
chieftains, there is a forecast of the authority already vested in the principle of hereditary monarchy, at the
very moment when it was about to be violated, and of the great part which would be played by that principle
in the history of France.
Before the day fixed for re-assembling, the last of the descendants of Charlemagne, Charles, duke of Lower
Lorraine, brother of the late King Lothaire, and paternal uncle of the late King Louis, "went to Rheims in
quest of the archbishop, and thus spake to him about his rights to the throne: 'All the world knoweth,
venerable father, that, by hereditary right, I ought to succeed my brother and my nephew. I am wanting in
nought that should be required, before all, from those who ought to reign, to wit, birth and the courage to dare.
Wherefore am I thrust out from the territory which all the world knows to have been possessed by my
ancestors? To whom could I better address myself than to you, when all the supports of my race have
disappeared? To whom, bereft as I am of honorable protection, should I have recourse but to you? By whom,
if not by you, should I be restored to the honors of my fathers? Please God things turn out favorably for me
and for my fortunes! Rejected, what, can become of me save to be exhibited as a spectacle to all who look on
me? Suffer yourself to be moved by some feeling of humanity: be compassionate towards a man who has been
tried by so many reverses!'"
Such language was more calculated to inspire contempt than compassion. "The metropolitan, firm in his
resolution, gave for answer these few words: 'Thou hast ever been associated with the perjured, the
sacrilegious, and the wicked of every sort, and now thou art still unwilling to separate from them: how canst
thou, in company with such men, and by means of such men, seek to attain to the sovereign power?' And
when Charles replied that he must not abandon his friends, but rather gain over others, the bishop said to
himself, 'Now that he possesses no position of dignity, he hath allied himself with the wicked, whose
companionship he will not, in any way, give up: what misfortune would it be for the good if he were elected
to the throne!' To Charles, however, he made answer that he would do nought without the consent of the
princes; and so left him."
At the time fixed, probably the 29th or 30th of June, 987, the grandees of Frankish Gaul who had bound
themselves by oath re-assembled at Senlis. Hugh Capet was present with his brother Henry of Burgundy, and
his brother-in-law Richard the Fearless, duke of Normandy. The majority of the direct vassals of the crown
were also there—Foulques Nerra (the Black), count of Anjou; Eudes, count of Blois, Chartres, and
Tours; Bouchard, count of Vent-Mine and Corbeil; Gautier, count of Vexin; and Hugh, count of Maine. Few
counts came from beyond the Loire; and some of the lords in the North, amongst others Arnulf II., count of
"This opinion having been proclaimed and well received, Duke Hugh was unanimously raised to the throne,
crowned on the 1st of July by the metropolitan and the other bishops, and recognized as king by the Gauls, the
Britons, the Normans, the Aquitanians, the Goths, the Spaniards, and the Gascons. Surrounded by the
grandees of the kingdom, he passed decrees and promulgated laws according to royal custom, regulating
successfully and disposing of all matters. That he might deserve so much good fortune, and under the
inspiration of so many prosperous circumstances, he gave himself up to deep piety. Wishing to have a
certainty of leaving, after his death, an heir to the throne, he conferred with his grandees, and after holding
council with them he first sent a deputation to the metropolitan of Rheims, who was then at Orleans, and
subsequently went himself to see him touching the association of his son Robert with himself upon the throne.
The archbishop having told him that two kings could not be, regularly, created in one and the same year, he
immediately showed a letter sent by Borel, duke of inner Spain, proving that that duke requested help against
the barbarians. . . . The metropolitan, seeing advantage was likely to result, ultimately yielded to the king's
reasons; and when the grandees were assembled, at the festival of our Lord's nativity, to celebrate the
coronation, Hugh assumed the purple, and he crowned solemnly, in the basilica of Sainte- Croix, his son
Robert, amidst the acclamations of the French."
Thus was founded the dynasty of the Capetians, under the double influence of German manners and feudal
connections. Amongst the ancient Germans royal heirship was generally confined to one and the same family;
but election was often joined with heirship, and had more than once thrust the latter aside. Hugh Capet was
head of the family which was the most illustrious in his time and closest to the throne, on which the personal
merits of Counts Eudes and Robert had already twice seated it. He was also one of the greatest chieftains of
feudal society, duke of the country which was already called France, and count of Paris—of that city
It has already been pointed out, in the case of Adalberon, archbishop of Rheims, what part was taken by the
clergy in this second change of dynasty; but the part played by it was so important and novel that we must
The authority of Adalberon was of great weight in the matter. As archbishop he was full of zeal, and at the
same time of wisdom in ecclesiastical administration. Engaging in politics, he showed boldness in attempting
a great change in the state, and ability in carrying it out without precipitation as well as without hesitation. He
had for his secretary and teacher a simple priest of Auvergne, who exercised over this enterprise an influence
more continuous and still more effectual than that of his archbishop. Gerbert, born at Aurillac, and brought up
in the monastery of St. Geraud, had, when he was summoned to the directorate of the school of Rheims,
already made a trip to Spain, visited Rome, and won the esteem of Pope John XIII. and of the Emperor Otho
II., and had thus had a close view of the great personages and great questions, ecclesiastical and secular, of his
time. On his establishment at Rheims, he pursued a double course with a double end: he was fond of study,
science, and the investigation of truth, but he had also a taste for the sphere of politics and of the world; he
excelled in the art of instructing, but also in the art of pleasing; and the address of the courtier was in him
united with the learning of the doctor. His was a mind lofty, broad, searching, prolific, open to conviction, and
yet inclined to give way, either from calculation or attraction, to contrary ideas, but certain to recur, under
favorable circumstances, to its original purpose. There was in him almost as much changeableness as zeal for
the cause he embraced. He espoused and energetically supported the elevation of a new dynasty and the
independence of the Roman Church. He was very active in the cause of Hugh Capet; but he was more than
once on the point of going over to King Lothaire or to the pretender Charles of Lorraine. He was in his time,
even more resolutely than Bossuet in the seventeenth century, the defender and practiser of what have since
been called the liberties of the Gallican Church, and in 992 he became, on this ground, Archbishop of Rheims;
but, after having been interdicted, in 995, by Pope John XVI., from the exercise of his episcopal functions in
France, he obtained, in 998, from Pope Gregory V., the archbishopric of Ravenna in Italy, and the favor of
Otho III. was not unconnected, in 999, with his elevation to the Holy See, which he occupied for four years,
with the title of Sylvester II., whilst putting in practice, but with moderation and dignity, maxims very
different from those which he had supported, fifteen years before, as a French bishop. He became, at this later
period of his life, so much the more estranged from France in that he was embroiled with Hugh Capet's son
and successor, King Robert, whose quondam preceptor he had been and of whose marriage with Queen
Bertha, widow of Eudes, count of Blois, he had honestly disapproved.
In 995, just when he had been interdicted by Pope John X VI. from his functions as Archbishop of Rheims,
Gerbert wrote to the abbot and brethren of the monastery of St. Geraud, where he had been brought up, "And
now farewell to your holy community; farewell to those whom I knew in old times, or who were connected
with me by blood, if there still survive any whose names, if not their features, have remained upon my
memory. Not that I have forgotten them through pride; but I am broken down, and—if it must be
said—changed by the ferocity of barbarians; what I learned in my boyhood I forgot in my youth; what I
desired in my youth, I despised in my old age. Such are the fruits thou hast borne for me, O pleasure! Such are
the joys afforded by the honors of the world! Believe my experience of it: the higher the great are outwardly
raised by glory, the more cruel is their inward anguish!"
Length of life brings, in the soul of the ambitious, days of hearty undeception; but it does not discourage them
from their course of ambition. Gerbert was, amongst the ambitious, at the same time one of the most exalted
in point of intellect and one of the most persistent as well as restless in attachment to the affairs of the world.
CHAPTER XIV.
After the sagacious Hugh Capet, the first three Capetians, Robert, Henry I., and Philip I., were very mediocre
individuals, in character as well as intellect; and their personal insignificance was one of the causes that
produced the emptiness of French history under their sway. Robert lacked neither physical advantages nor
moral virtues: "He had a lofty figure," says his biographer Helgaud, archbishop of Bourgcs, "hair smooth and
well arranged, a modest eye, a pleasant and gentle mouth, a tolerably furnished beard, and high shoulders. He
was versed in all the sciences, philosopher enough and an excellent musician, and so devoted to sacred
literature that he never passed a day without reading the Psalter and praying to the Most High God together
with St. David." He composed several hymns which were adopted by the Church, and, during a pilgrimage he
made to Rome, he deposited upon the altar of St. Peter his own Latin poems set to music. "He often went to
the church of St. Denis, clad in his royal robes and with his crown on his head; and he there conducted the
singing at matins, mass, and vespers, chanting with the monks and himself calling upon them to sing. When
he sat in the consistory, he voluntarily styled himself the bishops' client." Two centuries later, St. Louis
proved that the virtues of the saint are not incompatible with the qualities of the king; but the former cannot
form a substitute for the latter, and the qualities of king were to seek in Robert. He was neither warrior nor
politician; there is no sign that he ever gathered about him, to discuss affairs of state, the laic barons together
with the bishops, and when he interfered in the wars of the great feudal lords, notably in Burgundy and
Flanders, it was with but little energy and to but little purpose. He was hardly more potent in his family than
in his kingdom. It has already been mentioned that, in spite of his preceptor Gerbert's advice, he had espoused
Bertha, widow of Eudes, count of Blois, and he loved her dearly; but the marriage was assailed by the Church,
on the ground of kinship. Robert offered resistance, but afterwards gave way before the excommunication
pronounced by Pope Gregory V., and then espoused Constance daughter of William Taillefer, count of
Let us add to this summary of Robert's reign some facts which are characteristic of the epoch. In A.D. 1000,
in consequence of the sense attached to certain words in the Sacred Books, many Christians expected the end
of the world. The time of expectation was full of anxieties; plagues, famines, and divers accidents which then
took place in divers quarters, were an additional aggravation; the churches were crowded; penances, offerings,
absolutions, all the forms of invocation and repentance multiplied rapidly; a multitude of souls, in submission
or terror, prepared to appear before their Judge. And after what catastrophes? In the midst of what gloom or of
what light? These were fearful questions, of which men's imaginations were exhausted in forestalling the
solution. When the last day of the tenth and the first of the eleventh centuries were past, it was like a general
regeneration; it might have been said that time was beginning over again; and the work was commenced of
rendering the Christian world worthy of the future. "Especially in Italy and in Gaul," says the chronicler Raoul
Glaber, "men took in hand the reconstruction of the basilicas, although the greater part had no need thereof.
Christian peoples seemed to vie one with another which should erect the most beautiful. It was as if the world,
shaking itself together and casting off its old garments, would have decked itself with the white robes of
Christ." Christian art, in its earliest form of the Gothic style, dates from this epoch; the power and riches of the
Christian Church, in its different institutions, received, at this crisis of the human imagination, a fresh
impulse.
Other facts, some lamentable and some salutary, began, about this epoch, to assume in French history a place
which was destined before long to become an important one. Piles of fagots were set up, first at Orleans and
then at Toulouse, for the punishment of heretics. The heretics of the day were Manicheans. King Robert and
This is a literal translation of the monkish chronicler, who was far from favorable to the insurgent peasants,
and was more for applauding the suppression than justifying the insurrection. The suppression, though
undoubtedly effectual for the moment, and in the particular spots it reached, produced no general or lasting
effect. About a century after the cold recital of William of Jumieges, a poet-chronicler, Robert Wace, in his
Romance of Rou, a history in verse of Rollo and the first dukes of Normandy, related the same facts with far
more sympathetic feeling and poetical coloring. "The lords do us nought but ill," he makes the Norman
peasants say; "with them we have nor gain nor profit from our labors; every day is, for us, a day of suffering,
toil, and weariness; every day we have our cattle taken from us for road-work and forced service. We have
plaints and grievances, old and new exactions, pleas and processes without end, money-pleas, market-pleas,
road-pleas, forest-pleas, mill-pleas, black-mail-pleas, watch-and-ward-pleas. There are so many provosts,
bailiffs, and sergeants, that we have not one hour's peace; day by day they run us down, seize our movables,
and drive us from our lands. There is no security for us against the lords; and no pact is binding with them.
Why suffer all this evil to be done to us and not get out of our plight? Are we not men even as they are? Have
we not the same stature, the same limbs, the same strength—for suffering? All we need is courage. Let
us, then, bind ourselves together by an oath: let us swear to support one another; and if they will make war on
us, have we not, for one knight, thirty or forty young peasants, nimble and ready to fight with club, with
boar-spear, with arrow, with axe, and even with stones if they have not weapons? Let us learn to resist the
knights, and we shall be free to cut down trees, to hunt and fish after our fashion, and we shall work our will
in flood and field and wood."
So quick-spreading and contagious is evil amongst men, and so difficult to extirpate in the name of justice and
truth!
However, even in the midst of this cruel egotism and this gross unreason of the tenth and eleventh centuries,
the necessity, from a moral and social point of view, of struggling against such disgusting irregularities, made
itself felt, and found zealous advocates. From this epoch are to be dated the first efforts to establish, in
different parts of France, what was called God's peace, God's truce. The words were well chosen for
prohibiting at the same time oppression and revolt, for it needed nothing less than law and the voice of God to
put some restraint upon the barbarous manners and passions of men, great or small, lord or peasant. It is the
peculiar and glorious characteristic of Christianity to have so well understood the primitive and permanent
evil in human nature that it fought against all the great iniquities of mankind and exposed them in principle,
even when, in point of general practice, it neither hoped nor attempted to sweep them away. Bishops, priests,
and monks were, in their personal lives and in the councils of the Church, the first propagators of God's peace
or truce, and in more than one locality they induced the laic lords to follow their lead. In 1164, Hugh II., count
of Rodez, in concert with his brother Hugh, bishop of Rodez, and the notables of the district, established the
peace in the diocese of Rodez; "and this it is," said the learned Benedictines of the eighteenth century, in the
Art of Verifying Dates, "which gave rise to the toll of commune paix or pesade, which is still collected in
Rouergue." King Robert always showed himself favorable to this pacific work; and he is the first amongst the
five kings of France, in other respects very different,—himself, St. Louis, Louis XII, Henry IV., and
Louis XVI.,— who were particularly distinguished for sympathetic kindness and anxiety for the
popular welfare. Robert had a kindly feeling for the weak and poor; not only did he protect them, on occasion,
against the powerful, but he took pains to conceal their defaults, and, in his church and at his table, he suffered
himself to be robbed without complaint, that he might not have to denounce and punish the robbers.
"Wherefore at his death," says his biographer Helgaud, "there were great mourning and intolerable grief; a
countless number of widows and orphans sorrowed for the many benefits received from him; they did beat
their breasts and went to and from his tomb, crying, 'Whilst Robert was king and ordered all, we lived in
peace, we had nought to fear. May the soul of that pious father, that father of the senate, that father of all
good, be blest and saved! May it mount up and dwell forever with Jesus Christ, the King of kings!"
The marriages of Philip I. brought even more trouble and scandal than those of his father and grandfather. At
nineteen years of age, in 1072, he had espoused Bertha, daughter of Florent I., count of Holland, and in 1078
he had by her the son who was destined to succeed him with the title of Louis the Fat. But twenty years later,
1092, Philip took a dislike to his wife, put her away and banished her to Montreuil-sur-Mer, on the ground of
prohibited consanguinity. He had conceived, there is no knowing when, a violent passion for a woman
celebrated for her beauty, Bertrade, the fourth wife, for three years past, of Foulques le Roehin (the brawler),
count of Anjou. Philip, having thus packed off Bertha, set out for Tours, where Bertrade happened to be with
her husband. There, in the church of St. John, during the benediction of the baptismal fonts, they entered into
mutual engagements. Philip went away again; and, a few days afterwards, Bertrade was carried off by some
people he had left in the neighborhood of Tours, and joined him at Orleans. Nearly all the bishops of France,
and amongst others the most learned and respected of them, Yves, bishop of Chartres, refused their
benediction to this shocking marriage; and the king had great difficulty in finding a priest to render him that
service. Then commenced between Philip and the heads of the Catholic Church, Pope and bishops, a struggle
which, with negotiation upon negotiation and excommunication upon excommunication, lasted twelve years,
without the king's being able to get his marriage canonically recognized; and, though he promised to send
away Bertrade, he was not content with merely keeping her with him, but he openly jeered at
excommunication and interdicts. "It was the custom," says William of Malmesbury, "at the places where the
king sojourned, for divine service to be stopped; and, as soon as he was moving away, all the bells began to
peal. And then Philip would cry, as he laughed like one beside himself, 'Dost hear, my love, how they are
ringing us out?'" At last, in 1104, the Bishop of Chartres himself, wearied by the persistency of the king and
by sight of the trouble in which the prolongation of the interdict was plunging the kingdom, wrote to the Pope,
Pascal II., "I do not presume to offer you advice; I only desire to warn you that it were well to show for a
while some condescension towards the weaknesses of the man, so far as consideration for his salvation may
permit, and to rescue the country from the critical state to which it is reduced by the excommunication of this
prince." The Pope, consequently, sent instructions to the bishops of the realm; and they, at the king's
According to the statement of the learned Benedictines who studiously examined into this incident, it is
doubtful whether Philip I. broke off all intercourse with Bertrade. "Two years after his absolution, on the 10th
of October, 1106, he arrived at Angers, on a Wednesday," says a contemporary chronicler, "accompanied by
the queen named Bertrade, and was there received by Count Foulques and by all the Angevines, cleric and
laic, with great honors. The day after his arrival, on Thursday, the monks of St. Nicholas, introduced by the
queen, presented themselves before the king, and humbly prayed him, in concert with the queen, to
countenance, for the salvation of his soul and of the queen and his relatives and friends, all acquisitions made
by them in his dominions, or that they might hereafter make, by gift or purchase, and to be pleased to place his
seal on their titles to property. And the king granted their request."
The most complete amongst the chroniclers of the time, Orderic Vital, says, touching this meeting at Angers
of Bertrade's two husbands, "This clever woman had, by her skilful management, so perfectly reconciled these
two rivals, that she made them a splendid feast, got them both to sit at the same table, had their beds prepared,
the ensuing night, in the same chamber, and ministered to them according to their pleasure." The most
judicious of the historians and statesmen of the twelfth century, the Abby Suger, that faithful minister of Louis
the Fat, who cannot be suspected of favoring Bertrade, expresses himself about her in these terms: "This
sprightly and rarely accomplished woman, well versed in the art, familiar to her sex, of holding captive the
husbands they have outraged, had acquired such an empire over her first husband, the count of Anjou, in spite
of the affront she had put upon him by deserting him, that he treated her with homage as his sovereign, often
sat upon a stool at her feet, and obeyed her wishes by a sort of enchantment."
These details are textually given as the best representation of the place occupied, in the history of that time, by
the morals and private life of the kings. It would not be right, however, to draw therefrom conclusions as to
the abasement of Capetian royalty in the eleventh century, with too great severity. There are irregularities and
scandals which the great qualities and the personal glory of princes may cause to be not only excused but even
forgotten, though certainly the three Capetians who immediately succeeded the founder of the dynasty offered
their people no such compensation; but it must not be supposed that they had fallen into the plight of the
sluggard Merovingians or the last Carlovingians, wandering almost without a refuge. A profound change had
come over society and royalty in France. In spite of their political mediocrity and their indolent licentiousness,
Robert, Henry I., and Philip I., were not, in the eleventh century, insignificant personages, without authority or
practical influence, whom their contemporaries could leave out of the account; they were great lords,
proprietors of vast domains wherein they exercised over the population an almost absolute power; they had, it
is true, about them, rivals, large proprietors and almost absolute sovereigns, like themselves, sometimes
stronger even, materially, than themselves and more energetic or more intellectually able, whose superiors,
And as with the kingship, so with the community of France in the eleventh century. In spite of its dislocation
into petty incoherent and turbulent associations, it was by no means in decay. Irregularities of ambition,
hatreds and quarrels amongst neighbors and relatives, outrages on the part of princes and peoples were
incessantly renewed; but energy of character, activity of mind, indomitable will and zeal for the liberty of the
individual were not wanting, and they exhibited themselves passionately and at any risk, at one time by brutal
and cynical outbursts which were followed occasionally by fervent repentance and expiation, at another by
acts of courageous wisdom and disinterested piety. At the commencement of the eleventh century, William
III., count of Poitiers and duke of Aquitaine, was one of the most honored and most potent princes of his time;
all the sovereigns of Europe sent embassies to him as to their peer; he every year made, by way of devotion, a
trip to Rome, and was received there with the same honors as the emperor. He was fond of literature, and gave
up to reading the early hours of the night; and scholars called him another Maecenas. Unaffected by these
worldly successes intermingled with so much toil and so many miscalculations, he refused the crown of Italy,
when it was offered him at the death of the Emperor Henry II., and he finished, like Charles V. some centuries
later, by going and seeking in a monastery isolation from the world and repose. But, in the same domains and
at the end of the same century, his grandson William VII. was the most vagabondish, dissolute, and violent of
princes; and his morals were so scandalous that the bishop of Poitiers, after having warned him to no purpose,
considered himself forced to excommunicate him. The duke suddenly burst into the church, made his way
through the congregation, sword in hand, and seized the prelate by the hair, saying, "Thou shalt give me
absolution or die." The bishop demanded a moment for reflection, profited by it to pronounce the form of
excommunication, and forthwith bowing his head before the duke, said, "And now strike!" "I love thee not
well enough to send thee to paradise," answered the duke; and he confined himself to depriving him of his see.
For fury the duke of Aquitaine sometimes substituted insolent mockery. Another bishop, of Angouleme, who
was quite bald, likewise exhorted him to mend his ways. "I will mend," quoth the duke, "when thou shalt
comb back thy hair to thy pate." Another great lord of the same century, Foulques the Black, count of Anjou,
at the close of an able and glorious lifetime, had resigned to his son Geoffrey Martel the administration of his
countship. The son, as haughty and harsh towards his father as towards his subjects, took up arms against him,
and bade him lay aside the outward signs, which he still maintained, of power. The old man in his wrath
recovered the vigor and ability of his youth, and strove so energetically and successfully against his son that
he reduced him to such subjection as to make him do several miles "crawling on the ground," says the
chronicle, with a saddle on his back, and to come and prostrate himself at his feet. When Foulques had his son
thus humbled before him, he spurned him with his foot, repeating over and over again nothing but "Thou'rt
beaten, thou'rt beaten!" "Ay, beaten," said Geoffrey, "but by thee only, because thou art my father; to any
other I am invincible." The anger of the old man vanished at once: he now thought only how he might console
his son for the affront put upon him, and he gave him back his power, exhorting him only to conduct himself
with more moderation and gentleness towards his subjects. All was inconsistency and contrast with these
robust, rough, hasty souls; they cared little for belying themselves when they had satisfied the passion of the
moment.
The relations existing between the two great powers of the period, the laic lords and the monks, were not less
bitter or less unstable than amongst the laics themselves; and when artifice, as often happened, was employed,
These trifling matters are faithful samples of the dominant and fundamental characteristic of French society
during the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries, the true epoch of the middle ages. It was chaos, and
fermentation within the chaos the slow and rough but powerful and productive fermentation of unruly life. In
ideas, events, and persons there was a blending of the strongest contrasts: manners were rude and even savage,
yet souls were filled with lofty and tender aspirations; the authority of religious creeds at one time was on the
point of extinction, yet at another shone forth gloriously in opposition to the arrogance and brutality of
mundane passions; ignorance was profound, and yet here and there, in the very heart of the mental darkness,
gleamed bright centres of movement and intellectual labor. It was the period when Abelard, anticipating
freedom of thought and of instruction, drew together upon Mount St. Genevieve thousands of hearers anxious
to follow him in the study of the great problems of Nature and of the destiny of man and the world. And far
away from this throng, in the solitude of the abbey of Bee, St. Anselm was offering to his monks a Christian
and philosophical demonstration of the existence of God—"faith seeking understanding" (fides
quoerens intellectuan), as he himself used to say. It was the period, too, when, distressed at the licentiousness
which was spreading throughout the Church as well as lay society, two illustrious monks, St. Bernard and St.
Norbert, not only went preaching everywhere reformation of morals, but labored at and succeeded in
establishing for monastic life a system of strict discipline and severe austerity. Lastly, it was the period when,
in the laic world, was created and developed the most splendid fact of the middle ages, knighthood, that noble
soaring of imaginations and souls towards the ideal of Christian virtue and soldierly honor. It is impossible to
trace in detail the origin and history of that grand fact which was so prominent in the days to which it
belonged, and which is so prominent still in the memories of men; but a clear notion ought to be obtained of
its moral character and its practical worth. To this end a few pages shall be borrowed from Guizot's History of
Civilization in France. Let us first look on at the admission of a knight, such as took place in the twelfth
century. We will afterwards see what rules of conduct were imposed upon him, not only according to the
oaths which he had to take on becoming knight, but according to the idea formed of knighthood by the poets
of the day, those interpreters not only of actual life, but of men's sentiments also. We shall then understand,
without difficulty, what influence must have been exercised, in the souls and lives of men, by such sentiments
and such rules, however great may have been the discrepancy between the knightly ideal and the general
"The young man, the esquire who aspired to the title of knight, was first stripped of his clothes and placed in a
bath, which was symbolical of purification. On leaving the bath, he was clothed in a white tunic, which was
symbolical of purity, and a red robe, which was symbolical of the blood he was bound to shed in the service
of the faith, and a black sagum or close-fitting coat, which was symbolical of the death which awaited him as
well as all men.
"Thus purified and clothed, the candidate observed for four and twenty hours a strict fast. When evening
came, he entered church, and there passed the night in prayer, sometimes alone, sometimes with a priest and
sponsors, who prayed with him. Next day, his first act was confession; after confession the priest gave him the
communion; after the communion he attended a mass of the Holy Spirit; and, generally, a sermon touching the
duties of knights and of the new life he was about to enter on. The sermon over, the candidate advanced to the
altar with the knight's sword hanging from his neck. This the priest took off, blessed, and replaced upon his
neck. The candidate then went and knelt before the lord who was to arm him knight. 'To what purpose,' the
lord asked him, 'do you desire to enter the order? If to be rich, to take your ease and be held in honor without
doing honor to knighthood, you are unworthy of it, and would be, to the order of knighthood you received,
what the simoniacal clerk is to the prelacy.' On the young man's reply, promising to acquit himself well of the
duties of knight, the lord granted his request.
"Then drew near knights and sometimes ladies to reclothe the candidate in all his new array; and they put on
him, 1, the spurs; 2, the hauberk or coat of mail; 3, the cuirass; 4, the armlets and gauntlets; 5, the sword.
"He was what was then called adubbed (that is, adopted, according to Du Cange). The lord rose up, went to
him and gave him the accolade or accolee, three blows with the flat of the sword on the shoulder or nape of
the neck, and sometimes a slap with the palm of the hand on the cheek, saying, 'In the name of God, St.
Michael and St. George, I make thee knight.' And he sometimes added, 'Be valiant, bold, and loyal.'
"The young man, having been thus armed knight, had his helmet brought to him; a horse was led up for him;
he leaped on its back, generally without the help of the stirrups, and caracoled about, brandishing his lance
and making his sword flash. Finally he went out of church and caracoled about on the open, at the foot of the
castle, in presence of the people eager to have their share in the spectacle."
Such was what may be called the outward and material part in the admission of knights. It shows a persistent
anxiety to associate religion with all the phases of so personal an affair; the sacraments, the most august
feature of Christianity, are mixed up with it; and many of the ceremonies are, as far as possible, assimilated to
the administration of the sacraments. Let us continue our examination; let us penetrate to the very heart of
knighthood, its moral character, its ideas, the sentiments which it was the object to impress upon the knight.
Here again the influence of religion will be quite evident.
"The knight had to swear to twenty-six articles. These articles, however, did not make one single formula,
drawn up at one and the same time and all together; they are a collection of oaths required of knights at
different epochs and in more or less complete fashion from the eleventh to the fourteenth century. The
candidate swore, 1, to fear, reverence, and serve God religiously, to fight for the faith with all their might, and
to die a thousand deaths rather than ever renounce Christianity; 2, to serve their sovereign-prince faithfully,
and to fight for him and fatherland right valiantly; 3, to uphold the rights of the weaker, such as widows,
orphans, and damsels, in fair quarrel, exposing themselves on that account according as need might be,
provided it were not against their own honor or against their king or lawful prince; 4, that they would not
injure any one maliciously, or take what was another's, but would rather do battle with those who did so; 5,
that greed, pay, gain, or profit should never constrain them to do any deed, but only glory and virtue; 6, that
they would fight for the good and advantage of the common weal; 7, that they would be bound by and obey
the orders of their generals and captains who had a right to command them; 8, that they would guard the
honor, rank, and order of their comrades, and that they would neither by arrogance nor by force commit any
trespass against any one of them; 9, that they would never fight in companies against one, and that they would
eschew all tricks and artifices; 10, that they would wear but one sword, unless they had to fight against two or
more; 11, that in tourney or other sportive contest they would never use the point of their swords; 12, that
being taken prisoner in a tourney, they would be bound, on their faith and honor, to perform in every point the
conditions of capture, besides being bound to give up to the victors their arms and horses, if it seemed good to
take them, and being disabled from fighting in war or elsewhere without their leave; 13, that they would keep
faith inviolably with all the world, and especially with their comrades, upholding their honor and advantage,
wholly, in their absence; 14, that they would love and honor one another, and aid and succor one another
whenever occasion offered; 15, that, having made vow or promise to go on any quest or novel adventure, they
would never put off their arms, save for the night's rest; 16, that in pursuit of their quest or adventure they
would not shun bad and perilous passes, nor turn aside from the straight road for fear of encountering
powerful knights or monsters or wild beasts or other hinderance such as the body and courage of a single man
might tackle; 17, that they would never take wage or pay from any foreign prince; 18, that in command of
troops of men-at-arms, they would live in the utmost possible order and discipline, and especially in their own
country, where they would never suffer any harm or violence to be done; 19, that if they were bound to escort
dame or damsel, they would serve her, protect her, and save her from all danger and insult, or die in the
attempt; 20, that they would never offer violence to dame or damsel, though they had won her by deeds of
arms, against her will and consent; 21, that, being challenged to equal combat, they would not refuse, without
wound, sickness, or other reasonable hinderance; 22, that, having undertaken to carry out any enterprise, they
would devote to it night and day, unless they were called away for the service of their king and country; 23,
that if they made a vow to acquire any honor, they would not draw back without having attained either it or its
equivalent; 24, that they would be faithful keepers of their word and pledged faith, and that, having become
prisoners in fair warfare, they would pay to the uttermost the promised ransom, or return to prison, at the day
and hour agreed upon, on pain of being proclaimed infamous and perjured; 25, that on re-turning to the court
of their sovereign, they would render a true account of their adventures, even though they had sometimes been
worsted, to the king and the registrar of the order, on pain of being deprived of the order of knighthood; 26,
that above all things they would be faithful, courteous, and humble, and would never be wanting to their word
for any harm or loss that might accrue to them."
It is needless to point out that in this series of oaths, these obligations imposed upon the knights, there is a
moral development very superior to that of the laic society of the period. Moral notions so lofty, so delicate,
so scrupulous, and so humane, emanated clearly from the Christian clergy. Only the clergy thought thus about
the duties and the relations of mankind; and their influence was employed in directing towards the
accomplishment of such duties, towards the integrity of such relations, the ideas and customs engendered by
knighthood. It had not been instituted with so pious and deep a design, for the protection of the weak, the
maintenance of justice, and the reformation of morals; it had been, at its origin and in its earliest features, a
natural consequence of feudal relations and warlike life, a confirmation of the bonds established and the
sentiments aroused between different masters in the same country and comrades with the same destinies. The
clergy promptly saw what might be deduced from such a fact; and they made of it a means of establishing
more peacefulness in society, and in the conduct of individuals a more rigid morality. This was the general
work they pursued; and, if it were convenient to study the matter more closely, we might see, in the canons of
councils from the eleventh to the fourteenth centuries, the Church exerting herself to develop more and more
in this order of knight-hood, this institution of an essentially warlike origin, the moral and civilizing character
of which a glimpse has just been caught in the documents of knighthood itself.
In proportion as knighthood appeared more and more in this simultaneously warlike, religious, and moral
character, it more and more gained power over the imagination of men, and just as it had become closely
interwoven with their creeds, it soon became the ideal of their thoughts, the source of their noblest pleasures.
Poetry, like religion, took hold of it. From the eleventh century onwards, knighthood, its ceremonies, its
duties, and its adventures, were the mine from which the poets drew in order to charm the people, in order to
satisfy and excite at the same time that yearning of the soul, that need of events more varied and more
captivating, and of emotions more exalted and more pure than real life could furnish. In the springtide of
communities poetry is not merely a pleasure and a pastime for a nation; it is a source of progress; it elevates
and develops the moral nature of men at the same time that it amuses them and stirs them deeply. We have
just seen what oaths were taken by the knights and administered by the priests; and now, here is an ancient
ballad by Eustache Deschamps, a poet of the fourteenth century, from which it will be seen that poets
impressed upon knights the same duties and the same virtues, and that the influence of poetry had the same
aim as that of religion:
I.
II.
III.
A great deal has been said to the effect that all this is sheer poetry, a beautiful chimera without any
resemblance to reality. Indeed, it has just been remarked here, that the three centuries under consideration, the
middle ages, were, in point of fact, one of the most brutal, most ruffianly epochs in history, one of those
wherein we encounter most crimes and violence; wherein the public peace was most incessantly troubled; and
wherein the greatest licentiousness in morals prevailed. Nevertheless it cannot be denied that side by side with
these gross and barbarous morals, this social disorder, there existed knightly morality and knightly poetry. We
have moral records confronting ruffianly deeds; and the contrast is shocking, but real. It is exactly this
contrast which makes the great and fundamental characteristic of the middle ages. Let us turn our eyes
towards other communities, towards the earliest stages, for instance, of Greek society, towards that heroic age
of which Homer's poems are the faithful reflection. There is nothing there like the contrasts by which we are
struck in the middle ages. We do not see that, at the period and amongst the people of the Homeric poems,
there was abroad in the air or had penetrated into the imaginations of men any idea more lofty or more pure
than their every-day actions; the heroes of Homer seem to have no misgiving about their brutishness, their
ferocity, their greed, their egotism, there is nothing in their souls superior to the deeds of their lives. In the
France of the middle ages, on the contrary, though practically crimes and disorders, moral and social evils
abound, yet men have in their souls and their imaginations loftier and purer instincts and desires; their notions
of virtue and their ideas of justice are very superior to the practice pursued around them and amongst
themselves; a certain moral ideal hovers above this low and tumultuous community, and attracts the notice
and obtains the regard of men in whose life it is but very faintly reflected. The Christian religion,
undoubtedly, is, if not the only, at any rate the principal cause of this great fact; for its particular characteristic
is to arouse amongst men a lofty moral ambition by keeping constantly before their eyes a type infinitely
beyond the reach of human nature, and yet profoundly sympathetic with it. To Christianity it was that the
middle ages owed knighthood, that institution which, in the midst of anarchy and barbarism, gave a poetical
and moral beauty to the period. It was feudal knighthood and Christianity together which produced the two
great and glorious events of those times, the Norman conquest of England and the Crusades.
CHAPTER XV.
There was certainly ample reason for objection and disquietude. Not only was it a child of eight years of age
to whom Duke Robert, at setting out on his pious pilgrimage, was leaving Normandy; but this child had been
pronounced bastard by the duke his father at the moment of taking him for his heir. Nine or ten years before,
at Falaise, his favorite residence, Robert had met, according to some at a people's dance, according to others
on the banks of a stream where she was washing linen with her companions, a young girl named Harlette or
Harleve, daughter of a tanner in the town, where they show to this day, it is said, the window from which the
duke saw her for the first time. She pleased his fancy, and was not more strait-laced than the duke was
scrupulous; and Fulbert, the tanner, kept but little watch over his daughter. Robert gave the son born to him in
1027 the name of his glorious ancestor, William Longsword, the son and successor of Rollo. The child was
reared, according to some, in his father's palace, "right honorably as if he had been born in wedlock," but,
according to others, in the house of his grandfather, the tanner; and one of the neighboring burgesses, as he
saw passing one of the principal Norman lords, William de Bellesme, surnamed "The Fierce Talvas," stopped
him, ironically saying, "Come in, my lord, and admire your suzerain's son." The origin of young William was
in every mouth, and gave occasion for familiar allusions more often insulting than flattering. The epithet
bastard was, so to speak, incorporated with his name; and we cannot be astonished that it lived in history, for,
in the height of his power, he sometimes accepted it proudly, calling himself, in several of his charters,
William the Bastard (Gulielmus Notlzus). He showed himself to be none the less susceptible on this point
when in 1048, during the siege of Alencon, the domain of the Lord de Bellesme, the inhabitants hung from
Notwithstanding his recklessness and his being engrossed in his pilgrimage, Duke Robert had taken some care
for the situation in which he was leaving his son, and some measures to lessen its perils. He had appointed
regent of Normandy, during William's minority, his cousin, Alain V., duke of Brittany, whose sagacity and
friendship he had proved; and he had confided the personal guardianship of the child, not to his mother.
Harlette, who was left very much out in the cold, but to one of his most trusty officers, Gilbert Crespon, count
of Brionne; and the strong castle of Vaudreuil, the first foundation of which dated back, it was said, to Queen
Fredegonde, was assigned for the usual residence of the young duke. Lastly, to confirm with brilliancy his
son's right as his successor to the duchy of Normandy, and to assure him a powerful ally, Robert took him,
himself, to the court of his suzerain, Henry I., king of France, who recognized the title of William the Bastard,
and allowed him to take the oath of allegiance and homage. Having thus prepared, as best he could, for his
son's future, Robert set out on his pilgrimage. He visited Rome and Constantinople, everywhere displaying his
magnificence, together with his humility. He fell ill from sheer fatigue whilst crossing Asia Minor, and was
obliged to be carried in a litter by four negroes. "Go and tell them at home," said he to a Norman pilgrim he
met returning from the Holy Land, "that you saw me being carried to Paradise by four devils." On arriving at
Jerusalem, where he was received with great attention by the Mussulman emir in command there, he
discharged himself of his pious vow, and took the road back to Europe. But he was poisoned, by whom or for
what motive is not clearly known, at Nicaea, in Bithynia, where he was buried in the basilica of St.
Mary—an honor, says the chronicle, which had never been accorded to anybody.
From 1025 to 1042, during William's minority, Normandy was a prey to the robber-like ambition, the local
quarrels, and the turbulent and brutal passions of a host of petty castle-holders, nearly always at war, either
amongst themselves or with the young chieftain whose power they did not fear, and whose rights they
disputed. In vain did Duke Alain of Brittany, in his capacity as regent appointed by Duke Robert, attempt to
re-establish order; and just when he seemed on the road to success he was poisoned by those who could not
succeed in beating him. Henry I., king of France, being ill-disposed at bottom towards his Norman neighbors
and their young duke, for all that he had acknowledged him, profited by this anarchy to filch from him certain
portions of territory. Attacks without warning, fearful murders, implacable vengeance, and sanguinary
disturbances in the towns, were evils which became common, and spread. The clergy strove with courageous
perseverance against the vices and crimes of the period. The bishops convoked councils in their dioceses; the
laic lords, and even the people, were summoned to them; the peace of God was proclaimed; and the priests,
having in their hands lighted tapers, turned them towards the ground and extinguished them, whilst the
populace repeated in chorus, "So may God extinguish the joys of those who refuse to observe peace and
justice." The majority, however, of the Norman lords, refused to enter into the engagement. In default of
peace, it was necessary to be content with the truce of God. It commenced on Wednesday evening at sunset
and concluded on Monday at sunrise. During the four days and five nights comprised in this interval, all
aggression was forbidden; no slaying, wounding, pillaging, or burning could take place; but from sunrise on
Monday to sunset on Wednesday, for three clays and two nights, any violence became allowable, any crime
might recommence.
Meanwhile William was growing up, and the omens that had been drawn from his early youth raised the
popular hopes. It was reported that at his very birth, when the midwife had put him unswaddled on a little
heap of straw, he had wriggled about and drawn together the straw with his hands, insomuch that the midwife
said, "By my faith, this child beginneth full young to take and heap up: I know not what he will not do when
he is grown." At a little later period, when a burgess of Falaise drew the attention of the Lord William de
Bellesme to the gay and sturdy lad as he played amongst his mates, the fierce vassal muttered between his
For the establishment, however, of a young and disputed authority there is need of something more than
brilliant ceremonies and words partly minatory and partly coaxing. William had to show what he was made
of. A conspiracy was formed against him in the heart of his feudal court, and almost of his family. He had
given kindly welcome to his cousin Guy of Burgundy, and had even bestowed on him as a fief the countships
of Vernon and Brionne. In 1044 the young duke was at Valognes; when suddenly, at midnight, one of his
trustiest servants, Golet, his fool, such as the great lords of the time kept, knocked at the door of his chamber,
crying, "Open, open, my lord duke: fly, fly, or you are lost. They are armed, they are getting ready; to tarry is
death." William did not hesitate; he got up, ran to the stables, saddled his horse with his own hands, started
off, followed a road called to this day the duke's way, and reached Falaise as a place of safety. There news
came to him that the conspiracy was taking the form of insurrection, and that the rebels were seizing his
domains. William showed no more hesitation at Falaise than at Valognes; he started off at once, repaired to
Poissy, where Henry I., king of France, was then residing, and claimed, as vassal, the help of his suzerain
against traitors. Henry, who himself was brave, was touched by this bold confidence, and promised his young
vassal effectual support. William returned to Normandy, summoned his lieges, and took the field promptly.
King Henry joined him at Argence, with a body of three thousand men-at-arms, and a battle took place on the
10th of August, 1047, at Val des Dunes, three leagues from Caen. It was very hotly contested. King Henry,
unhorsed by a lance-thrust, ran a risk of his life; but he remounted and valiantly returned to the melley.
William dashed in wherever the fight was thickest, showing himself everywhere as able in command as ready
to expose himself. A Norman lord, Raoul de Tesson, held aloof with a troop of one hundred and forty knights.
"Who is he that bides yonder motionless?" asked the French king of the young duke. "It is the banner of Raoul
de Tesson," answered William; "I wot not that he hath aught against me." But, though he had no personal
grievance, Raoul de Tesson had joined the insurgents, and sworn that he would be the first to strike the duke
in the conflict. Thinking better of it, and perceiving William from afar, he pricked towards him, and taking off
his glove struck him gently on the shoulder, saying, "I swore to strike you, and so I am quit: but fear nothing
more from me." "Thanks, Raoul," said William; "be well disposed, I pray you." Raoul waited until the two
armies were at grips, and when he saw which way victory was inclined, he hasted to contribute thereto. It was
decisive: and William the Bastard returned to Val des Dunes really duke of Normandy.
He made vigorous but not cruel use of his victory. He demolished his enemies' strong castles, magazines as
they were for pillage no less than bulwarks of feudal independence; but there is nothing to show that he
indulged in violence towards persons. He was even generous to the chief concocter of the plot, Guy of
There soon came an opportunity for him to return to the king of France the kindness he had received. Geoffrey
Martel, duke of Anjou, being ambitious and turbulent beyond the measure of his power, got embroiled with
the king his suzerain, and war broke out between them. The duke of Normandy went to the aid of King Henry
and made his success certain, which cost the duke the fierce hostility of the count of Anjou and a four years'
war with that inconvenient neighbor; a war full of dangerous incidents, wherein William enhanced his
character, already great, for personal valor. In an ambuscade laid for him by Geoffrey Martel he lost some of
his best knights, "whereat he was so wroth," says a chronicle, "that he galloped down with such force upon
Geoffrey, and struck him in such wise with his sword that he dinted his helm, cut through his hood, lopped off
his car, and with the same blow felled him to earth. But the count was lifted up and remounted, and so fled
away."
William made rapid advances both as prince and as man. Without being austere in his private life, he was
regular in his habits, and patronized order and respectability in his household as well as in his dominions. He
resolved to marry to his own honor, and to the promotion of his greatness. Baldwin the Debonnair, count of
Flanders, one of the most powerful lords of the day, had a daughter, "Matilda, beautiful, well-informed, firm
in the faith, a model of virtue and modesty." William asked her hand in marriage. Matilda refused, saying, "I
would rather be veiled nun than given in marriage to a bastard." Hurt as he was, William did not give up. He
was even more persevering than susceptible; but he knew that he must get still greater, and make an
impression upon a young girl's imagination by the splendor of his fame and power. Some years later, being
firmly established in Normandy, dreaded by all his neighbors, and already showing some foreshadowings of
his design upon England, he renewed his matrimonial quest in Flanders, but after so strange a fashion that, in
spite of contemporary testimony, several of the modern historians, in their zeal, even at so distant a period, for
observance of the proprieties, reject as fabulous the story which is here related on the authority of the most
detailed account amongst all the chronicles which contain it. "A little after that Duke William had heard how
the damsel had made answer, he took of his folk, and went privily to Lille, where the duke of Flanders and his
wife and his daughter then were. He entered into the hall, and, passing on, as if to do some business, went into
the countess's chamber, and there found the damsel daughter of Count Baldwin. He took her by the tresses,
dragged her round the chamber, trampled her under foot, and did beat her soundly. Then he strode forth from
the chamber, leaped upon his horse, which was being held for him before the hall, struck in his spurs, and
went his way. At this deed was Count Baldwin much enraged; and when matters had thus remained a while,
Duke William sent once more to Count Baldwin to parley again of the marriage. The count sounded his
daughter on the subject, and she answered that it pleased her well. So the nuptials took place with very great
joy. And after the aforesaid matters, Count Baldwin, laughing withal, asked his daughter wherefore she had so
lightly accepted the marriage she had aforetime so cruelly refused. And she answered that she did not then
know the duke so well as she did now; for, said she, if he had not great heart and high emprise, he had not
been so bold as to dare come and beat me in my father's chamber."
Amongst the historians who treat this story as a romantic and untruthlike fable, some believe themselves to
have discovered, in divers documents of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, circumstances almost equally
singular as regards the cause of the obstacles met with at first by Duke William in his pretensions to the hand
of Princess Matilda, and as regards the motive for the first refusal on the part of Matilda herself. According to
some, the Flemish princess had conceived a strong passion for a noble Saxon, Brihtric Meaw, who had been
sent by King Edward the Confessor to the court of Flanders, and who was remarkable for his beauty. She
wished to marry him, but the handsome Saxon was not willing; and Matilda at first gave way to violent grief
on that account, and afterwards, when she became queen of England, to vindictive hatred, the weight of which
she made him feel severely. Other writers go still farther, and say that, before being sought in marriage by
However that may be, this marriage brought William an unexpected opportunity of entering into personal
relations with one of the most distinguished men of his age, and a man destined to become one of his own
most intimate advisers. In 1019, at the council of Rheims, Pope Leo IX., on political grounds rather than
because of a prohibited degree of relationship, had opposed the marriage of the duke of Normandy with the
daughter of the duke of Flanders, and had pronounced his veto upon it. William took no heed; and, in 1052 or
1053, his marriage was celebrated at Rouen with great pomp; but this ecclesiastical veto weighed upon his
mind, and he sought some means of getting it taken off. A learned Italian, Lanfranc, a juris-consult of some
fame already, whilst travelling in France and repairing from Avranches to Rouen, was stopped near Brionne
by brigands, who, having plundered him, left him, with his eyes bandaged, in a forest. His cries attracted the
attention of passers-by, who took him to a neighboring monastery, but lately founded by a pious Norman
knight retired from the world. Lanfranc was received in it, became a monk of it, was elected its prior, attracted
to it by his learned teaching a host of pupils, and won therein his own great renown whilst laying the
foundation for that of the abbey of Bee, which was destined to be carried still higher by one of his disciples,
St. Anselm. Lanfranc was eloquent, great in dialectics, of a sprightly wit, and lively in repartee. Relying upon
the pope's decision, he spoke ill of William's marriage with Matilda. William was informed of this, and in a fit
of despotic anger, ordered Lanfranc to be driven from the monastery and banished from Normandy, and even,
it is said, the dependency which he inhabited as prior of the abbey, to be burned. The order was executed; and
Lanfranc set out, mounted on a sorry little horse given him, no doubt, by the abbey. By what chance is not
known, but probably on a hunting-party, his favorite diversion, William, with his retinue, happened to cross
the road which Lanfranc was slowly pursuing. "My lord," said the monk, addressing him, "I am obeying your
orders; I am going away, but my horse is a sorry beast; if you will give me a better one, I will go faster."
William halted, entered into conversation with Lanfranc, let him stay, and sent him back with a present to his
abbey. A little while afterwards Lanfranc was at Rome, and defended before Pope Victor II. William's
marriage with Matilda: he was successful, and the pope took off the veto on the sole condition that the couple,
in sign of penitence, should each found a religious house. Matilda, accordingly, founded at Caen, for women,
the abbey of the Holy Trinity; and William, for men, that of St. Stephen. Lanfranc was the first abbot of the
latter; and when William became king of England, Lanfranc was made archbishop of Canterbury and primate
of the Church of England, as well as privy counsellor of his king. William excelled in the art, so essential to
government, of promptly recognizing the worth of men, and of appropriating their influence to himself whilst
exerting his own over them.
About the same time he gave his contemporaries, princes and peoples, new proofs of his ability and power.
Henry I., king of France, growing more and more disquieted at and jealous of the duke of Normandy's
ascendency, secretly excited against him opposition and even revolt in his dominions. These dealings led to
open war between the suzerain and the vassal, and the war concluded with two battles won by William, one at
Mortemer near Neuchatel in Bray, the other at Varaville near Troarrh "After which," said William himself,
"King Henry never passed a night tranquilly on my ground." In 1059 peace was concluded between the two
princes. Henry I. died almost immediately afterwards, and on the 25th of August, 1060, his son Philip I.
succeeded him, under the regency of Baldwin, count of Flanders, father of the Duchess Matilda. Duke
The passion for orderliness in his dominion did not cool his ardor for conquest. In 1063, after the death of his
young neighbor Herbert II., count of Maine, William took possession of this beautiful countship; not without
some opposition on the part of the inhabitants, nor without suspicion of having poisoned his rival, Walter,
count of Vexin. It is said that after this conquest William meditated that of Brittany; but there is every
indication that he had formed a far vaster design, and that the day of its execution was approaching.
From the time of Rollo's settlement in Normandy, the communications of the Normans with England had
become more and more frequent, and important for the two countries. The success of the invasions of the
Danes in England in the tenth century, and the reigns of three kings of the Danish line, had obliged the princes
of Saxon race to take refuge in Normandy, the duke of which, Richard I., had given his daughter Emma in
marriage to their grandfather, Ethelred II. When, at the death of the last Danish king, Hardicanute, the Saxon
prince Edward ascended the throne of his fathers, he had passed twenty-seven years of exile in Normandy,
and he returned to England "almost a stranger," in the words of the chronicles, to the country of his ancestors;
far more Norman than Saxon in his manners, tastes, and language, and surrounded by Normans, whose
numbers and prestige under his reign increased from day to day. A hot rivalry, nationally as well as courtly,
grew up between them and the Saxons. At the head of these latter was Godwin, count of Kent, and his five
sons, the eldest of whom, Harold, was destined before long to bear the whole brunt of the struggle. Between
these powerful rivals, Edward the Confessor, a pacific, pious, gentle, and undecided king, wavered
incessantly; at one time trying to resist, and at another compelled to yield to the pretensions and seditions by
which he was beset. In 1051 the Saxon party and its head, Godwin, had risen in revolt. Duke William, on
invitation, perhaps, from King Edward, paid a brilliant visit to England, where he found Normans everywhere
established and powerful, in Church as well as in State; in command of the fleets, ports, and principal English
places. King Edward received him "as his own son, gave him arms, horses, hounds, and hawking-birds," and
sent him home full of presents and hopes. The chronicler, Ingulf, who accompanied William on his return to
Normandy, and remained attached to him as private secretary, affirms that, during this visit, not only was
there no question, between King Edward and the duke of Normandy, of the latter's possible succession to the
throne of England, but that never as yet had this probability occupied the attention of William.
It is very doubtful whether William had said nothing upon the subject to King Edward at that time; and it is
certain, from William's own testimony, that he had for a long while been thinking about it. Four years after
this visit of the duke to England, King Edward was reconciled to and lived on good terms with the family of
the Godwins. Their father was dead, and the eldest son, Harold, asked the king's permission to go to
Normandy and claim the release of his brother and nephew, who had been left as hostages in the keeping of
Duke William. The king did not approve of the project. "I have no wish to constrain thee," said he to Harold:
"but if thou go, it will be without my consent: and, assuredly, thy trip will bring some misfortune upon thee
and our country. I know Duke William and his crafty spirit; he hates thee, and will grant thee nought unless he
see his advantage therefrom. The only way to make him give up the hostages will be to send some other than
thyself." Harold, however, persisted and went. William received him with apparent cordiality, promised him
the release of the two hostages, escorted him and his comrades from castle to castle, and from entertainment to
entertainment, made them knights of the grand Norman order, and even invited them, "by way of trying their
new spurs," to accompany him on a little warlike expedition he was about to undertake in Brittany. Harold
and his comrades behaved gallantly: and he and William shared the same tent and the same table. On
returning, as they trotted side by side, William turned the conversation upon his youthful connection with the
king of England. "When Edward and I," said he to the Saxon, "were living like brothers under the same roof,
he promised, if ever he became king of England, to make me heir to his kingdom; I should very much like
But a few days afterwards he summoned, at Avranches according to some, and at Bayeux according to others,
and, more probably still, at Bonneville-sur-Touques, his Norman barons; and, in the midst of this assembly, at
which Harold was present, William, seated with his naked sword in his hand, caused to be brought and placed
upon a table covered with cloth of gold two reliquaries. "Harold," said he, "I call upon thee, in presence of this
noble assemblage, to confirm by oath the promises thou didst make me, to wit, to aid me to obtain the
kingdom of England after the death of King Edward, to espouse my daughter Adele, and to send me thy sister
to be married to one of my people." Harold, who had not expected this public summons, nevertheless did not
hesitate any more than he had hesitated in his private conversation with William; he drew near, laid his hand
on the two reliquaries, and swore to observe, to the best of his power, his agreement with the duke, should he
live and God help. "God help!" repeated those who were present. William made a sign; the cloth of gold was
removed, and there was discovered a tub filled to the edge with bones and relies of all the saints that could be
got together. The chronicler-poet, Robert Wace, who, alone and long afterwards, recounts this last particular,
adds that Harold was visibly troubled at sight of this saintly heap; but he had sworn. It is honorable to human
nature not to be indifferent to oaths even when those who exact them have but small reliance upon them, and
when he who takes them has but small intention of keeping them. And so Harold departed laden with presents,
leaving William satisfied, but not over-confident.
When, on returning to England, Harold told King Edward what had passed between William and himself,
"Did I not warn thee," said the king, "that I knew William, and that thy journey would bring great misfortunes
upon thyself and upon our nation? Grant Heaven that those misfortunes come not during my life!" The king's
wish was not granted. He fell ill; and on the 5th of January, 1066, he lay on his couch almost at the point of
death. Harold and his kindred entered the chamber, and prayed the king to name a successor by whom the
kingdom might be governed securely. "Ye know," said Edward, "that I have left my kingdom to the Duke of
Normandy; and are there not here, among ye, those who have sworn to assure his succession?" Harold
advanced, and once more asked the king on whom the crown should devolve. "Take it, if it is thy wish,
Harold," said Edward; "but the gift will be thy ruin; against the duke and his barons thy power will not
suffice."—Harold declared that he feared neither the Norman nor any other foe. The king, vexed at this
importunity, turned round in his bed, saying, "Let the English make king of whom they will, Harold or
another; I consent;" and shortly after expired. The very day after the celebration of his obsequies, Harold was
proclaimed king by his partisans, amidst no small public disquietude, and Aldred, archbishop of York, lost no
time in anointing him.
William was in his park of Rouvray, near Rouen, trying a bow and arrows for the chase, when a faithful
servant arrived from England, to tell him that Edward was dead and Harold proclaimed king. William gave his
bow to one of his people, and went back to his palace at Rouen, where he paced about in silence, sitting down,
rising up, leaning upon a bench, without opening his lips and without any one of his people's daring to address
a word to him. There entered his seneschal William de Bretenil, of whom "What ails the duke?" asked they
who were present. "Ye will soon know," answered he. Then going up to the duke, he said, "Wherefore conceal
your tidings, my lord? All the city knows that King Edward is dead; and that Harold has broken his oath to
you, and had himself crowned king." "Ay," said William, "it is that which doth weigh me down." "My lord,"
said William Fitz-Osbern, a gallant knight and confidential friend of the duke, "none should be wroth over
what can be mended: it depends but on you to stop the mischief Harold is doing you; you shall destroy him, if
And he set himself to the work. But, being as far-sighted as he was ambitious, he resolved to secure for his
enterprise the sanction of religious authority and the formal assent of the Estates of Normandy. Not that he
had any inclination to subordinate his power to that of the Pope. Five years previously, Robert de
Grandmesnil, abbot of St. Evroul, with whom William had got embroiled, had claimed to re-enter his
monastery as master by virtue solely of an order from Pope Nicholas II. "I will listen to the legates of the
Pope, the common father of the faithful," said William, "if they come to me to speak of the Christian faith and
religion; but if a monk of my Estates permit himself a single word beyond his place, I will have him hanged
by his cowl from the highest oak of the nearest forest." When, in 1000, he denounced to Pope Alexander II.
the perjury of Harold, asking him at the same time to do him justice, he made no scruple about promising that,
if the Pope authorized him to right himself by war, he would bring back the kingdom of England to obedience
to the Holy See. He had Lanfranc for his negotiator with the court of Rome, and Pope Alexander II. had for
chief counsellor the celebrated monk Hildebrand, who was destined to succeed him under the name of
Gregory VII. The opportunity of extending the empire of the Church was too tempting to be spurned, and her
future head too bold not to seize it whatever might be the uncertainty and danger of the issue; and in spite of
hesitation on the part of some of the Pope's advisers, the question was promptly decided in accordance with
William's demand. Harold and his adherents were excommunicated, and, on committing his bull to the hands
of William's messenger, the Pope added a banner of the Roman Church and a ring containing, it is said, a hair
of St. Peter set in a diamond.
The Estates of Normandy were less easy to manage. William called them together at Lillebonne; and several
of his vassals showed a zealous readiness to furnish him with vessels and victual and to follow him beyond
the sea, but others declared that they were not bound to any such service, and that they would not lend
themselves to it; they had calls enough already, and had nothing more to spare. William Fitz-Osbern scouted
these objections. "He is your lord, and hath need of you," said he to the recalcitrants; "you ought to offer
yourselves to him, and not wait to be asked. If he succeed in his purpose, you will be more powerful as well as
he; if you fail him, and he succeed without you, he will remember it: show that you love him, and what ye do,
do with a good grace." The discussion was keen. Many persisted in saying, "True, he is our lord; but if we pay
him his rents, that should suffice: we are not bound to go and serve beyond the seas; we are already much
burdened for his wars." It was at last agreed that Fitz-Osbern should give the duke the assembly's reply; for he
knew well, they said, the ability of each. "If ye mind not to do what I shall say," said Fitz-Osbern, "charge me
not therewith." "We will be bound by it, and will do it," was the cry amidst general confusion. They repaired
to the duke's presence. "My lord," said Fitz-Osbern, "I trow that there be not in the whole world such folk as
these. You know the trouble and labor they have already undergone in supporting your rights; and they are
minded to do still more, and serve you at all points, this side the sea and t'other. Go you before, and they will
follow you; and spare them in nothing. As for me, I will furnish you with sixty vessels, manned with good
fighters." "Nay, nay," cried several of those present, prelates and barons, "we charged you not with such reply;
when he hath business in his own country, we will do him the service we owe him; we be not bound to serve
"William was very wroth," says the chronicler, "retired to a chamber apart, summoned those in whom he had
most confidence, and by their advice called before him his barons, each separately, and asked them if they
were willing to help him. He had no intention, he told them, of doing them wrong, nor would he and his, now
or hereafter, ever cease to treat with them in perfect courtesy; and he would give them, in writing, such
assurances as they were minded to devise. The majority of his people agreed to give him, more or less,
according to circumstances; and he had everything reduced to writing." At the same time he made an appeal to
all his neighbors, Bretons, Manceaux, and Angevines, hunting up soldiers wherever he could find them, and
promising all who desired them lands in England if he effected its conquest. Lastly he repaired in person, first
to Philip I., king of France, his suzerain, then to Baldwin V., count of Flanders, his father-in-law, asking their
assistance for his enterprise. Philip gave a formal refusal. "What the duke demands of you," said his advisers,
"is to his own profit and to your hurt; if you aid him, your country will be much burdened; and if the duke fail,
you will have the English your foes forever." The count of Flanders made show of a similar refusal; but
privately he authorized William to raise soldiers in Flanders, and pressed his vassals to follow him. William,
having thus hunted up and collected all the forces he could hope for, thought only of putting them in motion,
and of hurrying on the preparations for his departure.
Whilst, in obedience to his orders, the whole expedition, troops and ships, were collecting at Dives, he
received from Conan II., duke of Brittany, this message: "I learn that thou art now minded to go beyond sea
and conquer for thyself the kingdom of England. At the moment of starting for Jerusalem, Robert, duke of
Normandy, whom thou feignest to regard as thy father, left all his heritage to Alain, my father and his cousin:
but thou and thy accomplices slew my father with poison at Vimeux, in Normandy. Afterwards thou didst
invade his territory because I was too young to defend it; and, contrary to all right, seeing that thou art a
bastard, thou hast kept it until this day. Now, therefore, either give me back this Normandy which thou owest
me, or I will make war upon thee with all my forces." "At this message," say the chronicles, "William was at
first somewhat dismayed; but a Breton lord, who had sworn fidelity to the two counts, and bore messages
from one to the other, rubbed poison upon the inside of Conan's hunting-horn, of his horse's reins, and of his
gloves. Conan, having unwittingly put on his gloves and handled the reins of his horse, lifted his hands to his
face, and the touch having filled him with poisonous infection, he died soon after, to the great sorrow of his
people, for he was an able and brave man, and inclined to justice. And he who had betrayed him quitted
before long the army of Conan, and informed Duke William of his death."
Conan is not the only one of William's foes whom he was suspected of making away with by poison: there are
no proofs; but contemporary assertions are positive, and the public of the time believed them, without
surprise. Being as unscrupulous about means as ambitious and bold in aim, William was not of those whose
character repels such an accusation. What, however, diminishes the suspicion is that, after and in spite of
Conan's death, several Breton knights, and, amongst others, two sons of Count Eudes, his uncle, attended at
the trysting-place of the Norman troops and took part in the expedition.
Dives was the place of assemblage appointed for fleet and army. William repaired thither about the end of
August, 1066. But for several weeks contrary winds prevented him from putting to sea; some vessels which
made the attempt perished in the tempest; and some of the volunteer adventurers got disgusted, and deserted.
William maintained strict discipline amongst this multitude, forbidding plunder so strictly that "the cattle fed
in the fields in full security." The soldiers grew tired of waiting in idleness and often in sickness. "Yon is a
mad-man," said they, "who is minded to possess himself of another's land; God is against the design, and so
refuses us a wind."
About the 20th of September the weather changed. The fleet got ready, but could only go and anchor at St.
Valery at the mouth of the Somme. There it was necessary to wait several more days; impatience and
With what forces William undertook the conquest of England, how many ships composed his fleet, and how
many men were aboard the ships, are questions impossible to be decided with any precision, as we have
frequently before had occasion to remark, amidst the exaggerations and disagreements of chroniclers. Robert
Wace reports, in his Romance of Rou, that he had heard from his father, one of William's servants on this
expedition, that the fleet numbered six hundred and ninety-six vessels, but he had found in divers writings that
there were more than three thousand. M. Augustin Thierry, after his learned researches, says, in his history of
the Conquest of England by the Normans, that "four hundred vessels of four sails, and more than a thousand
transport ships, moved out into the open sea, to the sound of trumpets and of a great cry of joy raised by sixty
thousand throats." It is probable that the estimate of the fleet is pretty accurate, and that of the army
exaggerated. We saw in 1830 what efforts and pains it required, amidst the power and intelligent ability of
modern civilization, to transport from France to Algeria thirty-seven thousand men aboard three squadrons,
comprising six hundred and seventy-five ships of all sorts. Granted that in the eleventh century there was
more haphazard than in the nineteenth, and that there was less care for human life on the eve of a war; still,
without a doubt, the armament of Normandy in 1066 was not to be compared with that of France in 1830, and
yet William's intention was to conquer England, whereas Charles X. thought only of chastising the dey of
Algiers.
Whilst William was making for the southern coast of England, Harold was repairing by forced marches to the
north in order to defend, against the rebellion of his brother Tostig and the invasion of a Norwegian army, his
short-lived kingship thus menaced, at two ends of the country, by two formidable enemies. On the 25th of
September, 1066, he gained at York a brilliant victory over his northern foe; and, wounded as he was, he no
sooner learned that Duke William had on the 29th pitched his camp and planted his flag at Pevensey, than he
set out in haste for the south. As he approached, William received, from what source is not known, this
message: "King Harold hath given battle to his brother Tostig and the king of Norway. He hath slain them
both, and hath destroyed their army. He is returning at the head of numerous and valiant warriors, against
whom thine own, I trove, will be worth no more than wretched curs. Thou passest for a man of wisdom and
prudence; be not rash, plunge not thyself into danger; I adjure thee to abide in thy intrenchments, and not to
come really to blows." "I thank thy master," answered William, "for his prudent counsel, albeit he might have
given it to me without insult. Carry him back this reply: I will not hide me behind ramparts; I will come to
blows with Harold as soon as I may; and with the aid of Heaven's good will I would trust in the valor of my
men against his, even though I had but ten thousand to lead against his sixty thousand." But the proud
Some of the Saxon chieftains advised Harold to fall back on London, and ravage all the country, so as to
starve out the invaders. "By my faith," said Harold, "I will not destroy the country I have in keeping; I, with
my people, will fight." "Abide in London," said his younger brother, Gurth: "thou canst not deny that,
perforce or by free will, thou didst swear to Duke William; but, as for us, we have sworn nought; we will fight
for our country; if we alone fight, thy cause will be good in any case; if we fly, thou shalt rally us; if we fall,
thou shalt avenge us." Harold rejected this advice, "considering it shame to his past life to turn his back,
whatever were the peril." Certain of his people, whom he had sent to reconnoitre the Norman army, returned
saying that there were more priests in William's camp than warriors in his own; for the Normans, at this
period, wore shaven chins and short hair, whilst the English let hair and beard grow. "Ye do err," said Harold;
"these be not priests, but good men-at-arms, who will show us what they can do."
On the eve of the battle, the Saxons passed the night in amusement, eating, drinking, and singing, with great
uproar; the Normans, on the contrary, were preparing their arms, saying their prayers, and "confessing to their
priests—all who would." On the 14th of October, 1066, when Duke William put on his armor, his coat
of mail was given to him the wrong way. "Bad omen!" cried some of his people; "if such a thing had
happened to us, we would not fight to-day." "Be ye not disquieted," said the duke; "I have never believed in
sorcerers and diviners, and I never liked them; I believe in God, and in Him I put my trust." He assembled his
men-at-arms, and setting himself upon a high place, so that all might hear him, he said to them, "My true and
loyal friends, ye have crossed the seas for love of me, and for that I cannot thank ye as I ought; but I will make
what return I may, and what I have ye shall have. I am not come only to take what I demanded, or to get my
rights, but to punish felonies, treasons, and breaches of faith committed against our people by the men of this
country. Think, moreover, what great honor ye will have to-day if the day be ours. And bethink ye that, if ye
be discomfited, ye be dead men without help; for ye have not whither ye may retreat, seeing that our ships be
broken up, and our mariners be here with us. He who flies will be a dead man; he who fights will be saved.
For God's sake, let each man do his duty; trust we in God, and the day will be ours."
The battle, thus begun, lasted nine hours, with equal obstinacy on both sides, and varied success from hour to
hour. Harold, though wounded at the commencement of the fray, did not cease for a moment to fight, on foot,
with his two brothers beside him, and around him the troops of London, who had the privilege of forming the
king's guard when he delivered a battle. Rudely repulsed at the first charge, some bodies of Norman troops
fell back in disorder, and a rumor spread amongst them that the duke was slain; but William threw himself
before the fugitives, and, taking off his helmet, cried, "Look at me; here I am; I live, and by God's help will
conquer." So they returned to the combat. But the English were firm; the Normans could not force their
intrenchrnents; and William ordered his men to feign a retreat, and all but a flight. At this sight the English
bore down in pursuit: "and still Norman fled and Saxon pursued, until a trumpeter, who had been ordered by
the duke thus to turn back the Normans, began to sound the recall. Then were seen the Normans turning back
to face the English, and attacking them with their swords, and amongst the English, some flying, some dying,
some asking mercy in their own tongue." The struggle once more became general and fierce. William had
three horses killed under him; "but he jumped immediately upon a fresh steed, and left not long unavenged the
death of that which had but lately carried him." At last the intrenchments of the English were stormed; Harold
fell mortally wounded by an arrow which pierced his skull; his two brothers and his bravest comrades fell at
his side; the fight was prolonged between the English dispersed and the Normans remorselessly pursuing; the
standard sent from Rome to the duke of Normandy had replaced the Saxon flag on the very spot where Harold
had fallen; and, all around, the ground continued to get covered with dead and dying, fruitless victims of the
passions of the combatants. Next day William went over the field of battle; and he was heard to say, in a tone
of mingled triumph and sorrow, "Here is verily a lake of blood!"
There was, long after the battle of Senlac, or Hastings, as it is commonly called, a patriotic superstition in the
country to the effect that, when the rain had moistened the soil, there were to be seen traces of blood on the
ground where it had taken place.
Having thus secured the victory, William had his tent pitched at the very point where the standard which had
come from Rome had replaced the Saxon banner, and he passed the night supping and chatting with his
chieftains, not far from the corpses scattered over the battle-field. Next day it was necessary to attend to the
burial of all these dead, conquerors or conquered. William was full of care and affection towards his
comrades; and on the eve of the battle, during a long and arduous reconnoissance which he had undertaken
with some of them, he had insisted upon carrying, for some time, in addition to his own cuirass, that of his
faithful William Fitz-Osbern, who he saw was fatigued in spite of his usual strength; but towards his enemies
William was harsh and resentful. Githa, Harold's mother, sent to him to ask for her son's corpse, offering for it
its weight in gold. "Nay," said William, "Harold was a perjurer; let him have for burial-place the sand of the
shore, where he was so madly fain to rule." Two Saxon monks from Waltham Abbey, which had been
founded by Harold, came, by their abbot's order, and claimed for their church the remains of their benefactor;
and William, indifferent as he had been to a mother's grief, would not displease an abbey. But when the
monks set about finding the body of Harold, there was none to recognize it, and they had recourse to a young
girl, Edith, Swan's-neck, whom Harold had loved. She discovered amongst the corpses her lover's mutilated
Before following up his victory, William resolved to perpetuate the remembrance of it by a religious
monument, and he decreed the foundation of an abbey on the very field of the battle of Hastings, from which
It was not everything, however, to be victorious, it was still necessary to be recognized as king. When the
news of the defeat at Hastings and the death of Harold was spread abroad in the country, the emotion was
lively and seemed to be profound; the great Saxon national council, the Wittenagemote, assembled at London;
the remnants of the Saxon army rallied there; and search was made for other kings than the Norman duke.
Harold left two sons, very young and not in a condition to reign; but his two brothers-in-law, Edwin and
Morkar, held dominion in the north of England, whilst the southern provinces, and amongst them the city of
London, had a popular aspirant, a nephew of Edward the Confessor, in Edgar surnamed Atheliny (the noble,
the illustrious), as the descendant of several kings. What with these different pretensions, there were
discussion, hesitation, and delay; but at last the young Edgar prevailed, and was proclaimed king. Meanwhile
William was advancing with his army, slowly, prudently, as a man resolved to risk nothing and calculating
upon the natural results of his victory. At some points he encountered attempts at resistance, but he easily
overcame them, occupied successively Romney, Dover, Canterbury, and Rochester, appeared before London
without trying to enter it, and moved on Winchester, which was the residence of Edward the Confessor's
widow, Queen Editha, who had received that important city as dowry. Through respect for her, William, who
presented himself in the character of relative and heir of King Edward, did not enter the place, and merely
called upon the inhabitants to take the oath of allegiance to him and do him homage, which they did with the
queen's consent. William returned towards London and commenced the siege, or rather investment of it, by
establishing his camp at Berkhampstead, in the county of Hertford. He entered before long into secret
communication with an influential burgess, named Ansgard, an old man who had seen service, and who,
riddled with wounds, had himself carried about the streets in a litter. Ansgard had but little difficulty in
inducing the authorities of London to make pacific overtures to the duke, and William had still less difficulty
in convincing the messenger of the moderation of his designs. "The king salutes ye, and offers ye peace," said
Ansgard to the municipal authorities of London on his return from the camp: "'tis a king who hath no peer; he
is handsomer than the sun, wiser than Solomon, more active and greater than Charlemagne," and the
enthusiastic poet adds that the people as well as the senate eagerly welcomed these words, and renounced,
both of them, the young king they had but lately proclaimed. Facts were quick in responding to this quickly
produced impression; a formal deputation was sent to William's camp; the archbishops of Canterbury and
York, many other prelates and laic chieftains, the principal citizens of London, the two brothers-in- law of
Harold, Edwin and Morkar, and the young king of yesterday, Edgar Atheling himself, formed part of it; and
they brought to William, Edgar Atheling his abdication, and all the others their submission, with an express
invitation to William to have himself made king, "for we be wont," said they, "to serve a king, and we wish to
have a king for lord." William received them in presence of the chieftains of his army, and with great show of
moderation in his desires. "Affairs," said he, "be troubled still; there be still certain rebels; I desire rather the
peace of the kingdom than the crown; I would that my wife should be crowned with me." The Norman
chieftains murmured whilst they smiled; and one of them, an Aquitanian, Aimery de Thouars, cried out, "It is
passing modest to ask soldiers if they wish their chief to be king: soldiers are never, or very seldom, called to
such deliberations: let what we desire be done as soon as possible." William yielded to the entreaties of the
Saxon deputies and to the counsels of the Norman chieftains but, prudent still, before going in person to
London, he sent thither some of his officers with orders to have built there immediately, on the banks of the
Thames, at a point which he indicated, a fort where he might establish himself in safety. That fort, in the
course of time, became the Tower of London.
On entering London after all these delays and all these precautions, William fixed, for his coronation, upon
Christmas-day, December 25th, 1066. Either by desire of the prelate himself or by William's own order, it was
not the archbishop of Canterbury, Stigand, who presided, according to custom, at the ceremony; the duty
devolved upon the archbishop of York, Aldred, who had but lately anointed Edgar Atheling. At the appointed
hour, William arrived at Westminster Abbey, the latest work and the burial-place of Edward the Confessor.
The Conqueror marched between two hedges of Norman soldiers, behind whom stood a crowd of people, cold
and sad, though full of curiosity. A numerous cavalry guarded the approaches to the church and the quarters
adjoining. Two hundred and sixty counts, barons, and knights of Normandy went in with the duke. Geoffrey,
bishop of Coutanees, demanded in French, of the Normans, if they would that their duke should take the title
of King of the English. The archbishop of York demanded of the English, in the Saxon tongue, if they would
have for king the duke of Normandy. Noisy acclamations arose in the church and resounded outside. The
soldiery, posted in the neighborhood, took the confused roar for a symptom of something wrong, and in their
suspicious rage set fire to the neighboring houses. The flames spread rapidly. The people who were rejoicing
in the church caught the alarm, and a multitude of men and women of every rank flung themselves out of the
edifice. Alone and trembling, the bishops with some clerics and monks remained before the altar and
accomplished the work of anointment upon the king's head, "himself trembling," says the chronicle. Nearly all
the rest who were present ran to the fire, some to extinguish it, others to steal and pillage in the midst of the
consternation. William terminated the ceremony by taking the usual oath of Saxon kings at their coronation,
adding thereto, as of his own motion, a promise to treat the English people according to their own laws and as
well as they had ever been treated by the best of their own kings. Then he went forth from the church King of
England.
We will pursue no farther the life of William the Conqueror: for henceforth it belongs to the history of
England, not of France. We have entered, so far as he was concerned, into pretty long details, because we
were bound to get a fair understanding of the event and of the man; not only because of their lustre at the time,
but especially because of the serious and long-felt consequences entailed upon France, England, and, we may
say, Europe. We do not care just now to trace out those consequences in all their bearings; but we would like
to mark out with precision their chief features, inasmuch as they exercised, for centuries, a determining
influence upon the destinies of two great nations, and upon the course of modern civilization.
As to France, the consequences of the conquest of England by the Normans were clearly pernicious, and they
have not yet entirely disappeared. It was a great evil, as early as the eleventh century, that the duke of
Normandy, one of the great French lords, one of the great vassals of the king of France, should at the same
time become king of England, and thus receive an accession of rank and power which could not fail to render
more complicated and more stormy his relations with his French suzerain. From the eleventh to the fourteenth
century, from Philip I. to Philip de Valois, this position gave rise, between the two crowns and the two states,
to questions, to quarrels, to political struggles, and to wars which were a frequent source of trouble in France
to the government and the people. The evil and the peril became far greater still when, in the fourteenth
century, there arose between France and England, between Philip de Valois and Edward III., a question
touching the succession to the throne of France and the application or negation of the Salic law. Then there
commenced, between the two crowns and the two peoples, that war which was to last more than a hundred
years, was to bring upon France the saddest days of her history, and was to be ended only by the inspired
heroism of a young girl who, alone, in the name of her God and His saints, restored confidence and victory to
her king and her country. Joan of Arc, at the cost of her life, brought to the most glorious conclusion the
longest and bloodiest struggle that has devastated France and sometimes compromised her glory.
In spite of appearances to the contrary, and in view of her future interests, England was, in the eleventh
century, by the very fact of the conquest she underwent, in a better position than France. She was conquered,
it is true, and conquered by a foreign chieftain and a foreign army; but France also had been, for several
centuries previously, a prey to conquest, and under circumstances much more unfavorable than those under
which the Norman conquest had found and placed England. When the Goths, the Burgundians, the Franks, the
Saxons, and the Normans themselves invaded and disputed over Gaul, what was the character of the event?
Barbarians, up to that time vagabonds or nearly so, were flooding in upon populations disorganized and
enervated. On the side of the German victors, no fixity in social life; no general or anything like regular
government; no nation really cemented and constituted; but individuals in a state of dispersion and of almost
absolute independence: on the side of the vanquished Gallo-Romans, the old political ties dissolved; no strong
power, no vital liberty; the lower classes in slavery, the middle classes ruined, the upper classes depreciated.
Amongst the barbarians society was scarcely commencing; with the subjects of the Roman empire it no longer
existed; Charlemagne's attempt to reconstruct it by rallying beneath a new empire both victors and vanquished
was a failure; feudal anarchy was the first and the necessary step out of barbaric anarchy and towards a
renewal of social order.
It was not so in England, when, in the eleventh century, William transported thither his government and his
army. A people but lately come out of barbarism, conquered, on that occasion, a people still half barbarous.
Their primitive origin was the same; their institutions were, if not similar, at any rate analogous; there was no
fundamental antagonism in their habits; the English chieftains lived in their domains an idle, hunting life,
surrounded by their liegemen, just as the Norman barons lived. Society, amongst both the former and the
latter, was founded, however unrefined and irregular it still was; and neither the former nor the latter had lost
the flavor and the usages of their ancient liberties. A certain superiority, in point of organization and social
discipline, belonged to the Norman conquerors; but the conquered Anglo- Saxons were neither in a temper to
allow themselves to be enslaved nor out of condition for defending themselves. The conquest was destined to
entail cruel evils, a long oppression, but it could not bring about either the dissolution of the two peoples into
We are now about to anticipate ages, and get a glimpse, in their development, of the consequences which
attended this difference, so profound, in the position of France and of England, at the time of the formation of
the two states.
In England, immediately after the Norman conquest, two general forces are confronted, those, to wit, of the
two peoples. The Anglo-Saxon people is attached to its ancient institutions, a mixture of feudalism and
liberty, which become its security. The Norman army assumes organization on English soil according to the
feudal system which had been its own in Normandy. A principle of authority and a principle of resistance thus
exist, from the very first, in the community and in the government. Before long the principle of resistance gets
displaced; the strife between the peoples continues; but a new struggle arises between the Norman king and
his barons. The Norman kingship, strong in its growth, would fain become tyrannical; but its tyranny
encounters a resistance, also strong, since the necessity for defending themselves against the Anglo-Saxons
has caused the Norman barons to take up the practice of acting in concert, and has not permitted them to set
themselves up as petty, isolated sovereigns. The spirit of association receives development in England: the
ancient institutions have maintained it amongst the English landholders, and the inadequacy of individual
resistance has made it prevalent amongst the Norman barons. The unity which springs from community of
interests and from junction of forces amongst equals becomes a counter-poise to the unity of the sovereign
power. To sustain the struggle with success, the aristocratic coalition formed against the tyrannical kingship
has needed the assistance of the landed proprietors, great and small, English and Norman, and it has not been
able to dispense with getting their rights recognized as well as its own. Meanwhile the struggle is becoming
complicated; there is a division of parties; a portion of the barons rally round the threatened kingship;
sometimes it is the feudal aristocracy, and sometimes it is the king that summons and sees flocking to the
rescue the common people, first of the country, then of the towns. The democratic element thus penetrates into
and keeps growing in both society and government, at one time quietly and through the stolid influence of
necessity, at another noisily and by means of revolutions, powerful indeed, but nevertheless restrained within
certain limits. The fusion of the two peoples and the different social classes is little by little attaining
accomplishment; it is little by little bringing about the perfect formation of representative government with its
various component parts, royalty, aristocracy, and democracy, each invested with the rights and the strength
necessary for their functions. The end of the struggle has been arrived at; constitutional monarchy is founded;
by the triumph of their language and of their primitive liberties the English have conquered their conquerors.
It is written in her history, and especially in her history at the date of the eleventh century, how England found
her point of departure and her first elements of success in the long labor she performed, in order to arrive, in
1688, at a free, and, in our days, at a liberal government.
France pursued her end by other means and in the teeth of other fortunes. She always desired and always
sought for free government under the form of constitutional monarchy; and in following her history, step by
step, there will be seen, often disappearing and ever re-appearing, the efforts made by the country for the
accomplishment of her hope. Why then did not France sooner and more completely attain what she had so
often attempted? Amongst the different causes of this long miscalculation, we will dwell for the present only
on the historical reason just now indicated: France did not find, as England did, in the primitive elements of
French society the conditions and means of the political system to which she never ceased to aspire. In order
to obtain the moderate measure of internal order, without which society could not exist; in order to insure the
progress of her civil laws and her material civilization; in order even to enjoy those pleasures of the mind for
which she thirsts so much,— France was constantly obliged to have recourse to the kingly authority
and to that almost absolute monarchy which was far from satisfying her even when she could not do without
it, and when she worshipped it with an enthusiasm rather literary than political, as was the case under Louis
XIV. It was through the refined rather than profound development of her civilization, and through the zeal of
"In 1823, forty-seven years ago, after having studied," says M. Guizot, "in my Essays upon a Comparative
History of France and England, the great fact which we have just now attempted to make clearly understood, I
concluded my labor by saying, 'Before our revolution, this difference between the political fates of France and
England might have saddened a French-man: but now, in spite of the evils we have suffered and in spite of
those we shall yet, perhaps, suffer, there is no room, so far as we are concerned, for such sadness. The
advances of social equality and the enlightenments of civilization in France preceded political liberty; and it
will thus be the more general and the purer. France may reflect, without regret, upon any history: her own has
always been glorious, and the future promised to her will assuredly recompense her for all she has hitherto
lacked.' In 1870, after the experiences and notwithstanding the sorrows of my long life, I have still confidence
in our country's future. Never be it forgotten that God helps only those who help themselves and who deserve
his aid."
CHAPTER XVI.
Events soon rendered the pilgrimage to Jerusalem difficult, and for some time impossible. At the
commencement of the seventh century, the Greek empire was at war with the sovereigns of Persia, successors
of Cyrus and chiefs of the religion of Zoroaster. One of them, Khosroes II., invaded Judea, took Jerusalem, led
away captive the inhabitants, together with their patriarch, Zacharias, and even carried off to Persia the
precious relic which was regarded as the wood of the true cross, and which had been discovered, nearly three
centuries before, by the Empress Helena, whilst excavations were making on Calvary for the erection of the
church of the Holy Sepulchre. But fourteen years later, after several victories over the Persians, the Greek
emperor, Heraclius, retook Jerusalem, and re-entered Constantinople in triumph with the coffer containing the
sacred relic. He next year (in 629) carried it back to Jerusalem, and bore it upon his own shoulders to the top
of Calvary; and on this occasion was instituted the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. Great was the
joy in Christendom; and the pilgrimages to Jerusalem resumed their course.
But precisely at this epoch there appeared an enemy far more formidable for the Christians than the sectaries
of Zoroaster. In 622 Mahomet founded Islamism; and some years after his death, in 638, the second of the
khalifs, his successors, Omar, sent two of his generals, Khaled and Abou-Obeidah, to take Jerusalem. For to
the Mussulmans, also, Jerusalem was a holy city. Mahomet, it was said, had been thither; it was thence,
indeed, that he had started on his nocturnal ascent to heaven. On approaching the walls, the Arabs repeated
these words from the Koran: "Enter we the holy land which God hath promised us." The siege lasted four
months. The Christians at last surrendered, but only to Omar in person, who came from Medina to receive
their submission. A capitulation concluded with their patriarch, Sophronius, guaranteed them their lives, their
property, and their churches. "When the draft of the treaty was completed, Omar said to the patriarch,
'Conduct me to the temple of David.' Omar entered Jerusalem preceded by the patriarch, and followed by four
thousand warriors, followers of the Prophet, wearing no other arms but their swords. Sophronius took him,
first of all, to the Church of the Resurrection. 'Be-hold,' said he, 'the temple of David.' 'Thou sayest not true,'
said Omar, after a few moments' reflection; 'the Prophet gave me a description of the temple of David, and it
tallieth not with the building I now see.' The patriarch then conducted him to the Church of Sion. 'Here,' said
he, 'is the temple of David.' 'It is a lie,' rejoined Omar, and went his way, directing his steps towards the gate
named Bab-Mohammed. The spot on which now stands the Mosque of Omar was so encumbered with filth
that the steps leading to the street were covered with it, and that the rubbish reached almost to the top of the
vault. 'You can only get in here by crawling,' said the patriarch. 'Be it so,' answered Omar. The patriarch went
first; Omar, with his people, followed; and they arrived at the space which at this day forms the forecourt of
the mosque. There every one could stand upright. After having turned his eyes to right and left, and attentively
examined the place, 'Allah alchbar!' cried Omar; here is the temple of David, described to me by the Prophet.'"
He found the Sakhra (the rock which forms the summit of Mount Moriah,) and which, left alone after the
different destructions of the different temples, became the theme of a multitude of traditions and legends,
(Jewish and Mussulman) covered with filth, heaped up there by the Christians through hatred of the Jews.
"Omar spread his cloak over the rock, and began to sweep it; and all the Mussulmans in his train followed his
example." (Le Temple de Jerusalem, a monograph, pp. 73-75, by Count Melchior de Vogue, ch. vi.) The
Mosque of Omar rose up on the site of Solomon's temple. The Christians retained the practice of their religion
in their churches, but they were obliged to conceal their crosses and their sacred books. The bell no longer
summoned the faithful to prayer; and the pomp of ceremonies was forbidden them. It was far worse when
Omar, the most moderate of Mussulman fanatics, had left Jerusalem. The faithful were driven from their
houses, and insulted in their churches; additions were made to the tribute they had to pay to the new masters
of Palestine; they were prohibited from carrying arms and riding on horseback; a girdle of leather, which they
might not lay aside, was their badge of servitude; their conquerors brooked not even that the Christians should
speak the Arab tongue, reserved for disciples of the Koran; and the Christian people of Jerusalem had not the
From the seventh to the eleventh century the situation remained very much the same. The Mussulmans,
khalifs of Egypt or Persia, continued in possession of Jerusalem; and the Christians, native inhabitants or
foreign visitors, continued to be oppressed, harassed, and humiliated there. At two periods their condition was
temporarily better. At the commencement of the ninth century, Charlemagne reached even there with the
greatness of his mind and of his power. "It was not only in his own land and his own kingdom," says
Eginhard, "that he scattered those gratuitous largesses which the Greeks call alms; but beyond the seas, in
Syria, in Egypt, in Africa, at Jerusalem, at Alexandria, at Carthage, wherever he knew that there were
Christians living in poverty, he had compassion on their misery, and he delighted to send them money." In one
of his capitularies of the year 810 we find this paragraph: "Alms to be sent to Jerusalem to repair the churches
of God." "If Charlemagne was so careful to seek the friendship of the kings beyond the seas, it was above all
in order to obtain for the Christians living under their rule help and relief. . . . He kept up so close a friendship
with Haroun-al- Raschid, king of Persia, that this prince preferred his good graces to the alliance of the
sovereigns of the earth. Accordingly, when the ambassadors whom Charles had sent, with presents, to visit the
sacred tomb of our divine Saviour, and the site of the resurrection, presented themselves before him, and
expounded to him their master's wish, Haroun did not content himself with entertaining Charles's request; he
wished, besides, to give up to him the complete proprietorship of those places hallowed by the certification of
our redemption," and he sent him, with the most magnificent presents, the keys of the Holy Sepulchre. At the
end of the same century, another Christian sovereign, far less powerful and less famous, John Zimisces,
emperor of Constantinople, in a war against the Mussulmans of Asia, penetrated into Galilee, made himself
master of Tiberias, Nazareth, and Mount Tabor, received a deputation which brought him the keys of
Jerusalem, "and we have placed," he says himself, "garrisons in all the district lately subjected to our rule."
These were but strokes of foreign intervention, giving the Christians of Jerusalem gleams of hope rather than
lasting diminution of their miseries. However, it is certain that, during this epoch, pilgrimages multiplied, and
were often accomplished without obstacle. It was from France, England, and Italy that most of the pilgrims
went, and some of them wrote, or caused to be written, an account of their trip,—amongst others the
Italian Saint Valentine, the English Saint Willibald, and the French Bishop Saint Arculf, who had as
companion a Burgundian hermit named Peter, a singular resemblance in quality and name to the zealous
apostle of the Crusade three centuries later. The most curious of these narratives is that of a French monk,
Bernard, a pilgrim of about the year 870. "There is at Jerusalem," says he, "a hospice where admittance is
given to all who come to visit the place for devotion's sake, and who speak the Roman tongue; a church,
dedicated to St. Mary, is hard by the hospice, and possesseth a very noble library, which it oweth to the zeal of
the Emperor Charles the Great." This pious establishment had attached to it fields, vineyards, and a garden
situated in the valley of Jehosaphat.
But whilst there were a few isolated cases of Christians thus going to satisfy in the East their pious and
inquisitive zeal, the Mussulmans, equally ardent as believers and as warriors, carried Westward their creed
and their arms, established themselves in Spain, penetrated to the very heart of France, and brought on,
between Islamism and Christianity, that grand struggle in which Charles Martel gained, at Poitiers, the victory
for the Cross. It was really a definitive victory, and yet it did not end the struggle; the Mussulmans remained
masters in Spain, and continued to infest Southern France, Italy, and Sicily, preserving even, at certain points,
posts which they used as starting-points for distant ravages. Far then from calming down and resulting in
pacific relations, the hostility between the two races became more and more active and determined;
everywhere they opposed, fought, and oppressed one another, inflamed one against the other by the double
feelings of faith and ambition, hatred and fear. To this general state of affairs came to be added, about the end
of the tenth and beginning of the eleventh century, incidents best calculated to aggravate the evil. Hakem,
khalif of Egypt from 996 to 1021, persecuted the Christians, especially at Jerusalem, with all the violence of a
fanatic and all the capriciousness of a despot. He ordered them to wear upon their necks a wooden cross five
pounds in weight; he forbade them to ride on any animal but mules or asses; and, without assigning any
motive for his acts, he confiscated their goods and carried off their children. It was told to him one day that,
These and many other similar stories reached the West, spread amongst the Christian people and roused them
to pity for their brethren in the East and to wrath against the oppressors. And it was at a critical period, in the
midst of the pious alarms and desires of atonement excited by the expectation of the end of the world a
thousand years after the coming of the Lord, that the Christian population saw this way opened for purchasing
remission of their sins by delivering other Christians from suffering, and by avenging the wrongs of their
creed. On all sides arose challenges and appeals to the warlike ardor of the faithful. The greatest mind of the
age, Gerbert, who had become Pope Sylvester II., constituted himself interpreter of the popular feeling. He
wrote, in the name of the Church of Jerusalem, a letter addressed to the universal Church: "To work, then,
soldier of Christ! Be our standard-bearer and our champion! And if with arms thou canst not do so, aid us with
thy words, thy wealth. What is it, pray, that thou givest, and to whom, pray, dost thou give? Of thine
abundance thou givest a small matter, and thou givest to Him who hath freely given thee all thou possessest;
but He will not accept freely that which thou shalt give; for he will multiply thine offering and will pay it back
to thee hereafter." Some years after Gerbert, another great mind, the greatest among the popes of the middle
ages, Gregory VII., proclaimed an expedition, at the head of which he would place himself, to go and deliver
Jerusalem and the Christians of the East from the insults and the tyranny of the infidels.
Such being the condition of facts and minds, pilgrimages to Jerusalem became, from the ninth to the eleventh
century, more and more numerous and considerable. "It would never have been believed," says the
contemporary chronicler Raoul Glaber, "that the Holy Sepulchre could attract so prodigious an influx. First
the lower classes, then the middle, afterwards the most potent kings, the counts, the marquises, the prelates,
and lastly, what had never heretofore been seen, many women, noble or humble, undertook this pilgrimage."
In 1026, William Traillefer, count of Angouleme; in 1028, 1035, and 1039, Foulques the Black, count of
Anjou; in 1035, Robert the Magnificent, duke of Normandy, father of William the Conqueror; in 1086, Robert
the Frison, count of Flanders; and many other great feudal lords quitted their estates, or, rather, their states, to
go and—not deliver, not conquer, but—simply visit the Holy Land. It was not long before great
numbers were joined to great names. In 1054, Liedbert, bishop of Cambrai, started for Jerusalem with a
following of three thousand Picard or Flemish pilgrims; and in 1064, the archbishop of Mayence and the
bishops of Spire, Cologne, Bamberg, and Utrecht set out on their way from the borders of the Rhine with
more than ten thousand Christians behind them. After having passed through Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria,
Thrace, Constantinople, Asia Minor, and Syria, they were attacked in Palestine by hordes of Arabs, were
forced to take refuge in the ruins of an old castle, and were reduced to capitulation; and when at last,
"preceded by the rumors of their battles and their perils, they arrived at Jerusalem, they were received in
triumph by the patriarch, and were conducted, to the sound of timbrels and with the flare of torches, to the
church of the Holy Sepulchre. The misery they had fallen into excited the pity of the Christians of Asia; and,
after having lost more than three thousand of their comrades, they returned to Europe to relate their tragic
adventures and the dangers of a pilgrimage to the Holy Land." (Histoire des Croisades, by M. Michaud, t. i. p.
62.)
Amidst this agitation of Western Christendom, in 1076, two years after Pope Gregory VII. had proclaimed his
approaching expedition to the Holy Land, news arrived in Europe to the effect that the most barbarous of
Asiatics and of Mussulmans, the Turks, after having first served and then ruled the khalifs of Persia, and
afterwards conquered the greater part of the Persian empire, had hurled themselves upon the Greek empire,
invaded Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine, and lately taken Jerusalem, where they practised against the
Christians, old inhabitants or foreign visitors, priests and worshippers, dreadful cruelties and intolerable
exactions, worse than those of the Persian or Egyptian khalifs.
It often happens that popular emotions, however profound and general, remain barren, just as in the vegetable
world many sprouts appear at the surface of the soil and die without having grown and fructified. It is not
sufficient for the bringing about of great events and practical results that popular aspirations should be merely
manifested; it is necessary, further, that some great soul, some powerful will, should make itself the organ and
agent of the public sentiment, and bring it to fecundity by becoming its personification. The Christian passion,
in the eleventh century, for the deliverance of Jerusalem and the triumph of the Cross was fortunate in this
respect. An obscure pilgrim, at first a soldier, then a married man and father of several children, then a monk
and a vowed recluse, Peter the Hermit, who was born in the neighborhood of Amiens, about 1030, had gone,
as so many others had, to Jerusalem "to say his prayers there." Struck disconsolate at the sight of the
sufferings and insults undergone by the Christians, he had an interview with Simeon, patriarch of Jerusalem,
who "recognizing in him a man of discretion and full of experience in affairs of the world, set before him in
detail all the evils with which the people of God, in the holy city, were afflicted. 'Holy father,' said Peter to
him, 'if the Roman Church and the princes of the West were informed, by a man of energy and worthy of
belief, of all your calamities, of a surety they would essay to apply some remedy thereto by word and deed.
Write, then, to our lord the pope and to the Roman Church, and to the kings and princes of the West, and
strengthen your written testimony by the authority of your seal. As for me, I shrink not from taking upon me a
task for the salvation of my soul; and with the help of the Lord I am ready to go and seek out all of them,
solicit them, show unto them the immensity of your troubles, and pray them all to hasten on the day of your
relief.'" The patriarch eagerly accepted the pilgrim's offer; and Peter set out, going first of all to Rome, where
he handed to Pope Urban II. the patriarch's letters, and commenced in that quarter his mission of zeal. The
pope promised him not only support, but active co-operation when the propitious moment for it should arrive.
Peter set to work, being still the pilgrim everywhere, in Europe, as well as at Jerusalem. "He was a man of
very small stature, and his outside made but a very poor appearance; yet superior powers swayed this
miserable body; he had a quick intellect and a penetrating eye, and he spoke with ease and fluency. . . . We
saw him at that time," says his contemporary Guibert de Nogent, "scouring city and town, and preaching
everywhere; the people crowded round him, heaped presents upon him, and celebrated his sanctity by such
great praises that I remember not that like honor was ever rendered to any other person. He displayed great
generosity in the disposal of all things that were given him. He restored wives to their husbands, not without
the addition of gifts from himself, and he re-established, with marvellous authority, peace and good
understanding between those who had been at variance. In all that he did or said he seemed to have in him
something divine, insomuch that people went so far as to pluck hairs from his mule to keep as relics. In the
open air he wore a woollen tunic, and over it a serge cloak which came down to his heels; he had his arms and
feet bare; he ate little or no bread, and lived chiefly on wine and fish."
In 1095, after the preaching errantry of Peter the Hermit, Pope Urban II. was at Clermont, in Auvergne,
presiding at the grand council, at which thirteen archbishops and two hundred and five bishops or abbots were
met together, with so many princes and lay-lords, that "about the middle of the month of November the towns
and the villages of the neighborhood were full of people, and divers were constrained to have their tents and
pavilions set up amidst the fields and meadows, notwithstanding that the season and the country were cold to
an extreme." The first nine sessions of the council were devoted to the affairs of the Church in the West; but at
the tenth Jerusalem and the Christians of the East became the subject of deliberation. The Pope went out of the
From the midst of the throng arose one prolonged and general shout, "God willeth it! God willeth it!" The
Pope paused for a moment; and then, making a sign with his hand as if to ask for silence, he continued, "If the
Lord God were not in your souls, ye would not all have uttered the same words. In the battle, then, be those
your war-cry, those words that came from God; in the army of the Lord let nought be heard but that one shout,
'God willeth it! God willeth it!' We ordain not, and we advise not, that the journey be undertaken by the old or
the weak, or such as be not suited for arms, and let not women set out without their husbands or their brothers;
let the rich help the poor; nor priests nor clerks may go without the leave of their bishops; and no layman shall
commence the march save with the blessing of his pastor. Whosoever hath a wish to enter upon this
pilgrimage, let him wear upon his brow or his breast the cross of the Lord, and let him, who, in
accomplishment of his desire, shall be willing to march away, place the cross behind him, between his
shoulders; for thus he will fulfil the precept of the Lord, who said, 'He that doth not take up his cross and
follow Me, is not worthy of Me.'"
Religious enthusiasm was not the only, but the first and the determining motive of the crusade. It is to the
honor of humanity, and especially to the honor of the French nation, that it is accessible to the sudden sway of
a moral and disinterested sentiment, and resolves, without prevision as well as without premeditation, upon
acts which decide, for many a long year, the course and the fate of a generation, and, it may be, of a whole
people. We have seen in our own day, in the conduct of populace, national assemblies, and armies, under the
impulse not any longer of religious feeling, but of political and social agitation, France thus giving herself up
to the rush of sentiments, generous indeed and pure, but without the least forecast touching the consequences
of the ideas which inspired them or the acts which they entailed. It is with nations as with armies; the side of
glory is that of danger; and great works are wrought at a heavy cost, not only of happiness, but also of virtue.
It would be wrong, nevertheless, to lack respect for and to speak evil of enthusiasm: it not only bears witness
to the grandeur of human nature, it justly holds its place and exercises its noble influence in the course of the
great events which move across the scene of human errors and vices, according to the vast and inscrutable
design of trod. It is quite certain that the crusaders of the eleventh century, in their haste to deliver Jerusalem
from the Mussulmans, were far from foreseeing that, a few centuries after their triumph, Jerusalem and the
Christian East would fall again beneath the yoke of the Mussulmans and their barbaric stagnation; and this
future, had they caught but a glimpse of it, would doubtless have chilled their zeal. But it is not a whit the less
certain that, in view of the end, their labor was not in vain; for, in the panorama of the world's history, the
crusades marked the date of the arrest of Islamism, and powerfully contributed to the decisive preponderance
of Christian civilization.
To religious enthusiasm there was joined another motive less disinterested, but natural and legitimate, which
was the still very vivid recollection of the evils caused to the Christians of the West by the Mussulman
There is moreover great motive power in a spirit of enterprise and a taste for adventure. Care-for-nothingness
is one of man-kind's chief diseases, and if it plays so conspicuous a part in comparatively enlightened and
favored communities, amidst the labors and the enjoyments of an advanced civilization, its influence was
certainly not less in times of intellectual sloth and harshly monotonous existence. To escape therefrom, to
satisfy in some sort the energy and curiosity inherent in man, the people of the eleventh century had scarcely
any resource but war, with its excitement and distant excursions into unknown regions. Thither rushed the
masses of the people, whilst the minds which were eager, above everything, for intellectual movement and for
knowledge, thronged, on the mountain of St. Genevieve, to the lectures of Abelard. Need of variety and
novelty, and an instinctive desire to extend their views and enliven their existence, probably made as many
crusaders as the feeling against the Mussulmans and the promptings of piety.
The Council of Clermont, at its closing on the 28th of November, 1095, had fixed the month of August in the
following year, and the feast of the Assumption, for the departure of the crusaders for the Holy Land; but the
people's impatience did not brook this waiting, short as it was in view of the greatness and difficulties of the
enterprise. As early as the 8th of March, 1096, and in the course of the spring three mobs rather than armies
set out on the crusade, with a strength, it is said, of eighty or one hundred thousand persons in one case, and of
fifteen or twenty thousand in the other two. Persons, not men, for there were amongst them many women and
children, whole families, in fact, who had left their villages, without organization and without provisions,
calculating that they would be competent to find their own way, and that He who feeds the young ravens
would not suffer to die of want pilgrims wearing His cross. Whenever, on their road, a town came in sight, the
children asked if that were Jerusalem. The first of these mobs had for its head Peter the Hermit himself, and a
Burgundian knight called Walter Havenought; the second had a German priest named Gottschalk; and the
third a Count Emico, of Leiningen, potent in the neighborhood of Mayence. It is wrong to call them heads, for
they were really nothing of the kind; their authority was rejected, at one time as tyrannical, at another as
useless. "The grasshoppers," was the saying amongst them in the words of Solomon's proverbs, "have no king,
and yet they go in companies." In crossing Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, and the provinces of the Greek
empire, these companies, urged on by their brutal passions or by their necessities and material wants,
abandoned themselves to such irregularities that, as they went, princes and peoples, instead of welcoming
them as Christians, came to treat them as enemies, of whom it was necessary to get rid at any price. Peter the
Hermit and Gottschalk made honorable and sincere efforts to check the excesses of their following, which
were a source of so much danger; but Count Emico, on the contrary, says William of Tyre, "himself took part
in the plunder, and incited his comrades to crime." Thus, at one time taking the offensive, at another
compelled to defend themselves against the attacks of the justly irritated inhabitants, these three immense
companies of pilgrims, these disorderly volunteers, with great difficulty arrived, after enormous losses, at the
gates of Constantinople. Either through fear or through pity, the Greek emperor, Alexis (or Alexius)
Comnenus, permitted them to pitch their camp there; "but before long, plenty, idleness, and the sight of the
riches of Constantinople brought once more into the camp license, indiscipline, and a thirst after brigandage.
Whilst awaiting the war against the Mussulmans, the pilgrims pillaged the houses, the palaces, and even the
churches in the outskirts of Byzantium. To deliver his capital from these destructive guests, Alexis furnished
them with vessels, and got them shipped off across the Bosphorus."
Bohemond, prince of Tarento, commanded the third army, composed principally of Italians and warriors of
various origins come to Italy to share in the exploits and fortunes of his father, the celebrated Robert Guiscard,
founder of the Norman kingdom of Naples, who was at one time the foe, and at another the defender, of Pope
Gregory VII., and who died in the island of Cephalonia just as he was preparing to attempt the conquest of
Constantinople. Bohemond had neither less ambition nor less courage and ability than his father. "His
appearance," says Anna Comnena, "impressed the eye as much as his reputation astounded the mind; his
height surpassed that of all his comrades; his blue eyes gleamed readily with pride and anger; when he spoke
you would have said he had made eloquence his study; and when he showed himself in armor, you might have
believed that he had never done aught but handle lance and sword. Brought up in the school of Norman
heroes, be concealed calculations of policy beneath the exterior of force, and, although he was of a haughty
disposition, he knew how to be blind to a wrong when there was nothing to be gained by avenging it. He had
learned from his father to regard as foes all whose dominions and riches he coveted; and he was not restrained
by fear of God, or by man's opinions, or by his own oaths. It was not the deliverance of the tomb of Christ
which fired his zeal or decided him upon taking up the cross; but, as he had vowed eternal enmity to the Greek
emperors, he smiled at the idea of traversing their empire at the head of an army, and, full of confidence in his
fortunes, he hoped to make for himself a kingdom before arriving at Jerusalem."
Bohemond had as friend and faithful comrade his cousin Tancred de Hauteville, great-grandson, through his
mother, Emma, of Robert Guiscard, and, according to all his contemporaries, the type of a perfect Christian
knight, neither more nor less. "From his boyhood," says Raoul of Caen, his servitor before becoming his
biographer, "he surpassed the young by his skill in the management of arms, and the old by the strictness of
his morals. He disdained to speak ill of whoever it might be, even when ill had been spoken of himself. About
With these four chieftains, who have remained illustrious in history,— that grave wherein small
reputations are extinguished,—were associated, for the deliverance of the Holy Land, a throng of feudal
lords, some powerful as well as valiant, others valiant but simple knights; Hugh, count of Vermaudois, brother
of Philip I., king of France; Robert of Normandy, called Shorthose, son of William the Conqueror; Robert,
count of Flanders; Stephen, count of Blois; Raimbault, count of Orange; Baldwin, count of Hainault; Raoul of
Beaugency; Gerard of Roussillon, and many others whose names contemporary chroniclers and learned
moderns have gathered together. Not one of the reigning sovereigns of Europe, kings or emperors, of France,
England, Spain, or Germany, took part in the first crusade. It was the feudal nation, great and small, castle
owners and populace, who rose in mass for the deliverance of Jerusalem and the honor of Christendom.
These three great armies of crusaders got on the march from August to October, 1096, wending their way,
Godfrey de Bouillon by Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria; Bohemond by the south of Italy and the
Mediterranean; and Count Raymond of Toulouse by Northern Italy, Friuli, and Dalmatia. They arrived one
after the other in the empire of the East and at the gates of Constantinople. Godfrey de Bouillon was the first
to appear there, and the Emperor Alexis Comnenus learned with dismay that other armies of crusaders would
soon follow that which was already so large. It was not long before Bohemond and Raymond appeared.
Alexis behaved towards these formidable allies with a mixture of pusillanimity and haughtiness, promises and
lies, caresses and hostility, which irritated without intimidating them, and rendered it impossible for them to
feel any confidence or conceive any esteem. At one time he was thanking them profusely for the support they
were bringing him against the infidels; at another he was sending troops to harass them on their road, and,
when they reached Constantinople, he demanded that they should swear fealty and obedience to him, as if
they were his own subjects. One day he was refusing them provisions and attempting to subdue them by
famine; and the next he was lavishing feasts and presents upon them. The crusaders, on their side, when
provisions fell short, spread themselves over the country and plundered it without scruple; and, when they
encountered hostile troops of Greeks, charged them without warning. When the emperor demanded of them
fealty and homage, the count of Toulouse answered that he had not come to the East in search of a master.
Godfrey do Bouillon, after resisting every haughty pretension, being as just as he was dignified,
acknowledged that the crusaders ought to restore to the emperor the towns which had belonged to the empire,
and an arrangement to that effect was concluded between them. Bohemond had a proposal submitted to
Godfrey to join him in attacking the Greek empire and taking possession at once of Byzantium; but Godfrey
rejected the proposal, with the reminder that he had come only to fight the infidels. The emperor, fully
informed of the greediness as well as ambition of Bohemond, introduced him one day into a room full of
treasures. "Here," said Bohemond, "is wherewith to conquer kingdoms." Alexis had the treasures removed to
Bohemond's, who at first refused, and ended by accepting them. It is even said that he asked the emperor for
the title of Grand Domestic or of General of the Empire of the East. Alexis, who had held that dignity and
who knew that it was the way to the throne, gave the Norman chieftain a present refusal, with a promise of it
on account of future services to be rendered by him to the empire and the emperor.
This posture, on either side, of inactivity, ill-will, and irritation, could not last long. On the approach of the
spring of 1097, the crusader chiefs and their troops, first Godfrey de Bouillon, then Bohemond and Tancred,
and afterwards Count Raymond of Toulouse, passed the Bosphorus, being conveyed across either in their own
vessels or those of the Emperor Alexis, who encouraged them against the infidels, and at the same time had
the infidels supplied with information most damaging to the crusaders. Having effected a junction in Bithynia,
the Christian chiefs resolved to go and lay siege to Nicaea, the first place, of importance, in possession of the
Turks. Whilst marching towards the place they saw coming to meet then, with every appearance of the most
woful destitution, Peter the Hermit, followed by a small band of pilgrims escaped from the disasters of their
expedition, who had passed the winter, as he had, in Bithynia, waiting for more fortunate crusaders. Peter,
affectionately welcomed by the chiefs of the army, recounted to them "in detail," says William of Tyre, "how
the people, who had preceded them under his guidance, had shown themselves destitute of intelligence,
improvident, and unmanageable at the same time; and so it was far more by their own fault than by the deed
of any other that they had succumbed to the weight of their calamities." Peter, having thus relieved his heart
and recovered his hopes, joined the powerful army of crusaders who had come at last; and, on the 15th of
May, 1097, the siege of Nicaea began.
The town was in the hands of a Turkish sultan, Kilidge-Arslan, whose father, Soliman, twenty years before,
had invaded Bithynia and fixed his abode at Nicrea. He, being informed of the approach of the crusaders, had
issued forth, to go and assemble all his forces; but he had left behind his wife, his children, and his treasures,
and he had sent messengers to the inhabitants, saying, "Be of good courage, and fear not the barbarous people
who make show of besieging our city; to-morrow, before the seventh hour of the day, ye shall be delivered
from your enemies." And he did arrive on the 16th of May, says the Armenian historian, Matthias of Edessa,
at the head of six hundred thousand horsemen. The historians of the crusaders are infinitely more moderate as
to the number of their foes; they assign to Kilidge-Arslan only fifty or sixty thousand men, and their testimony
is far more trustworthy, being that of the victors. In any case, the Christians and the Turks fought valiantly for
two days under the walls of Niccea, and Godfrey de Bouillon did justice to his fame for valor and skill by
laying low a Turk "remarkable amongst all," says William of Tyre, "for his size and strength, whose arrows
caused much havoc in the ranks of our men." Kilidge-Arslan, being beaten, withdrew to collect fresh troops,
and, after six weeks' siege, the crusaders believed themselves on the point of entering Nicaea as masters,
when, on the 26th of June, they saw floating on the ramparts the standard of the Emperor Alexis. Their
surprise was the greater in that they had just written to the emperor to say that the city was on the point of
surrendering, and they added, "We earnestly invite you to lose no time in sending some of your princes with
sufficient retinue, that they may receive and keep in honor of your name the city which will deliver itself up to
us. As for us, after having put it in the hands of your highness, we will not show any delay in pursuing, with
God's help, the execution of our projects." Alexis had anticipated this loyal message. Being in constant secret
communication with the former subjects of the Greek empire, and often even with their new masters the
All the army of the crusaders put themselves in motion I cross Asia Minor from the north-west to the
south-east, and to reach Syria. At their arrival before Nicaea they numbered, it is said, five hundred thousand
foot and one hundred thousand horse, figures evidently too great, for everything indicates that at the opening
of the crusade the three great armies, starting from France and Italy under Godfrey de Bouillon, Bohemond
and Raymond of Toulouse, did not reach this number, and the, had certainly lost many during their long
march through their sufferings and in their battles. However that may be, after they had marched all in one
mass for two days, and had then extended themselves over a larger area, for the purpose, no doubt, of more
easily finding provisions, the crusaders broke up into two main bodies, led, one by Godfrey de Bouillon and
Raymond of Toulouse, the other by Bohemond and Tancred. On the 1st of July, at daybreak, this latter body,
encamped at a short distance from Doryleum, in Phrygia, saw descending from the neighboring heights a
cloud of enemies who burst upon the Christians, first rained a perfect hail of missiles upon them, and then
penetrated into their camp, even to the tents assigned to the women, children, and old men, the numerous
following of the crusaders. It was Kilidge-Arslan, who, after the fall of Nicaea, had raised this new army of
Saracens, and was pursuing the conquerors on their march. The battle began in great disorder; the chiefs in
person sustained the first shock; and the duke of Normandy, Robert Shorthose, took in his hand his white
banner, embroidered with gold, and waving it over his head, threw himself upon the Turks, shouting, "God
willeth it! God willeth it!" Bohemond obstinately sought out Kilidge-Arslan in the fray; but at the same time
he sent messengers in all haste to Godfrey de Bouillon, as yet but a little way off, to summon him to their aid.
Godfrey galloped up, and, with some fifty of his knights, preceding the rest of his army, was the first to throw
himself into the midst of the Turks. Towards mid-day the whole of the first body arrived, with standards
flying, with the sound of trumpets and with the shouting of warriors. Kilidge-Arslan and his troops fell back
upon the heights whence they had descended. The crusaders, without taking breath, ascended in pursuit. The
Turks saw themselves shut in by a forest of lances, and fled over wood and rock; and "two days afterwards
they were still flying," says Albert of Aix, "though none pursued them, unless it were God himself." The
victory of Doryleum opened the whole country to the crusaders, and they resumed their march towards Syria,
paying their sole attention to not separating again.
It was not long before they had to grapple with other dangers against which bravery could do nothing. They
were crossing, under a broiling sun, deserted tracts which their enemies had taken good care to ravage. Water
and forage were not to be had; the men suffered intolerably from thirst; horses died by hundreds; at the head
of their troops marched knights mounted on asses or oxen; their favorite amusement, the chase, became
impossible for them; for their hawking-birds too—the falcons and gerfalcons they had brought with
them—languished and died beneath the excessive heat. One incident obtained for the crusaders a
momentary relief. The dogs which followed the army, prowling in all directions, one day returned with their
paws and coats wet; they had, therefore, found water; and the soldiers set themselves to look for it, and, in
fact, discovered a small river in a remote valley. They got water-drunk, and more than three hundred men, it is
On arriving in Pisidia, a country intersected by Water-courses, meadows, and woods, the army rested several
days; but at that very point two of its most competent and most respected chiefs were very nearly taken from
it. Count Raymond of Toulouse, who was also called Raymond of Saint- Gilles, fell so ill that the bishop of
Orange was reading over him the prayers for the dying, when one of those present cried out that the count
would assuredly live, for that the prayers of his patron saint, Gilles, had obtained for him a truce with death.
And Raymond recovered. Godfrey de Bouillon, again, whilst riding in a forest, came upon a pilgrim attacked
by a bear, and all but fallen a victim to the ferocious beast. The duke drew his sword and urged his horse
against the bear, which, leaving the pilgrim, rushed upon the assailant. The frightened horse reared; Godfrey
was thrown, and, according to one account, immediately remounted; but, according to another, he fell, on the
contrary, together with his horse; however, he sustained a fearful struggle against the bear, and ultimately
killed it by plunging his sword up to the hilt into its belly, says 'William of Tyre, but with so great an effort,
and after receiving so serious a wound, that his soldiers, hurrying up at the pilgrim's report, found him
stretched on the ground, covered with blood, and unable to rise, and carried him back to the camp, where he
was, for several weeks, obliged to be carried about in a litter in the rear of the army.
Through all these perils they continued to advance, and they were approaching the heights of Taurus, the
bulwark and gate of Syria, when a quarrel which arose between two of the principal crusader chiefs was like
to seriously endanger the concord and strength of the army. Tancred, with his men, had entered Tarsus, the
birthplace of St. Paul, and had planted his flag there. Although later in his arrival, Baldwin, brother of
Godfrey de Bouillon, claimed a right to the possession of the city, and had his flag set up instead of Tancred's,
which was thrown into a ditch. During several days the strife was fierce and even bloody; the soldiers of
Baldwin were the more numerous, and those of Tancred considered their chief too gentle, and his bravery, so
often proved, scarcely sufficed to form an excuse for his forbearance. Chiefs and soldiers, however, at last,
saw the necessity for reconciliation, and made mutual promises to sink all animosity. On returning to the
general camp, Tancred was received with marked favor; for the majority of the crusaders, being unconcerned
in the quarrel at Tarsus, liked him for his bravery and for his gentleness equally. Baldwin, on the contrary,
was much blamed, even by his brother Godfrey; but he was far more ambitious on his own account than
devoted to the common cause. He had often heard tell of Armenia and Mesopotamia, their riches and the large
number of Christians living there, almost equally independent of Greeks and Turks; and, in the hope of
finding there a chance of greatly improving his personal fortunes, he left the army of the crusaders at Maresa,
on the very eve of the day on which the chiefs came to the decision that no one should for the future move
away from the flag, and taking with him a weak detachment of two hundred horse and one thousand or twelve
hundred foot, marched towards Armenia. His name and his presence soon made a stir there; and he got hold of
two little towns which received him eagerly. Edessa, the capital of Armenia and metropolis of Mesopotamia,
was peopled by Christians; and a Greek governor, sent from Constantinople by the emperor, lived there, on
payment of a tribute to the Turks. Internal dissensions and the fear ever inspired by the vicinity of the Turks
kept the city in a state of lively agitation; and bishop, people, and Greek governor, all appealed to Baldwin.
He presented himself before Edessa with merely a hundred horsemen, having left the remainder of his forces
in garrison at the town he had already occupied. All the population came to meet him, bearing branches of
olive and singing chants in honor of their deliverer. But it was not long before outbreaks and alarms began
again; and Baldwin looked on at then, waiting for power to be offered him. Still there was no advance; the
Greek governor continued where be was; and Baldwin muttered threats of his departure. The popular
disquietude was extreme; and the Greek governor, old and detested as he was, thought to smooth all by
adopting the Latin chief and making him his heir. This, however, caused but a short respite; Baldwin left the
governor to be massacred in a fresh outbreak; the people came and offered him the government, and he
became Prince of Edessa, and, ere long, of all the neighboring country, without thinking any more of
Jerusalem, of which, nevertheless, he was destined at no distant day to be king.
In spite of their triumph the crusaders were not so near marching on Jerusalem as Bohemond had promised.
Everywhere, throughout Syria and Mesopotamia, the Mussulmans were rising to go and deliver Antioch; an
immense army was already in motion; there were eleven hundred thousand men according to Matthew of
Edessa, six hundred and sixty thousand according to Foucher of Chartres, three hundred thousand according
to Raoul of Caen, and only two hundred thousand according to William of Tyre and Albert of Aix. The
discrepancy in the figures is a sufficient proof of their untruthfulness. The last number was enough to disquiet
the crusaders, already much reduced by so many marches, battles, sufferings, and desertions. An old
Mussulman warrior, celebrated at that time throughout Western Asia, Corbogha, sultan of Mossoul (hard by
what was ancient Nineveh), commanded all the hostile forces, and four days after the capture of Antioch he
was already completely round the place, enclosing the crusaders within the walls of which they had just
become the masters. They were thus and all on a sudden besieged in their turn, having even in the very midst
of them, in the citadel which still held out, a hostile force. Whilst they had been besieging Antioch, the
Emperor Alexis Comnenus had begun to march with an army to get his share in their successes, and was
advancing into Asia Minor when he heard that the Mussulmans, in immense numbers, were investing the
Christian army in Antioch, and not in a condition, it was said, to hold out long. The emperor immediately
retraced his steps towards Constantinople, and the crusaders found that they had no Greek aid to hope for. The
blockade, becoming stricter day by day, soon brought about a horrible famine in Antioch. Instead of repeating
here, in general terms, the ordinary descriptions of this cruel scourge, we will reproduce its particular and
striking features as they have been traced out by contemporary chroniclers. "The Christian people," says
William of Tyre, "had recourse before long, to procure themselves any food whatever, to all sorts of shameful
means. Nobles, free men, did not blush to hungrily stretch out the hand to nobodies, asking with troublesome
"We are assured," says William of Tyre, "that in view of such woes and such weaknesses, the princes,
despairing of any means of safety, held amongst themselves a secret council, at which they decided to
abandon the army and all the people, fly in the middle of the night, and retreat to the sea." According to the
Armenian historian Matthew of Edessa, the princes would seem to have resolved, in this hour of dejection, not
to fly and leave the army to its fate, but "to demand of Corboghzi an assurance for all, under the bond of an
oath, of personal safety, on the promise of surrendering Antioch to him; after which they would return home."
Several Arab historians, and amongst them Ibn-el-Athir, Aboul- Faradje, and Aboul-Feda confirm the
statement of conditions. Whatever may have been the real turn taken by the promptings of weakness amongst
the Christians, Godfrey de Bouillon and Adhemar, bishop of Puy, energetically rejected them all; and an
unexpected incident, considered as miraculous, reassured the wavering spirits both of soldiers and of chiefs. A
priest of Marseilles, Peter Bartholomew, came and announced to the chiefs that St. Andrew had thrice
appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Go into the church of my brother Peter at Antioch; and hard by the high
altar thou wilt find, on digging up the ground, the head of the spear which pierced our Redeemer's side. That,
carried in front of the army, will bring about the deliverance of the Christians." The appointed search was
solemnly conducted under the eye of twelve reputable witnesses, priests and knights; the whole army was in
attendance at the closed gates of the church; the spear-head was found and carried off in triumph; a pious
enthusiasm restored to all present entire confidence; and with loud shouts they demanded battle. The chiefs
judged it proper to announce their determination to the chief of the Mussulmans; and for this mission they
chose Peter the Hermit, who was known to them as a bold and able speaker. Peter, on arriving at the enemy's
camp, presented himself without any mark of respect before the Sultan, Corbogha, surrounded by his satraps,
and said, "The sacred assembly of princes pleasing to God who are at Antioch doth send me unto thy
Highness, to advise thee that thou art to cease from thy importunities, and that thou abandon the siege of a city
which the Lord in His divine mercy hath given up to them. The prince of the apostles did wrest that city from
idolatry, and convert it to the faith of Christ. Ye had forcibly but unjustly taken possession of it. They who be
moved by a right lawful anxiety for this heritage of their ancestors make their demand of thee that thou choose
between divers offers: either give up the siege of the city, and cease troubling the Christians, or, within three
days from hence, try the power of our arms. And that thou seek not after any, even a lawful, subterfuge, they
offer thee further choice between divers determinations: either appear alone in person to fight with one of our
princes, in order that, if victorious, thou mayest obtain all thou canst demand, or, if vanquished, thou mayest
remain quiet; or, again, pick out divers of thine who shall fight, on the same terms, with the same number of
ours; or, lastly, agree that the two armies shall prove, one against the other, the fortune of battle." "Peter,"
answered Corbogha ironically, "it is not likely that the affairs of the princes who have sent thee be in such
state that they can thus offer me choice betwixt divers proposals, and that I should be bound to accept that
On returning to camp, Peter the Hermit was about to set forth in detail, before all the people of the crusaders,
the answer of Corbogha, his pride, his threats, and the pomp with which he was surrounded; but Godfrey de
Bouillon, "fearing lest the multitude, already crushed beneath the weight of their woes, should be stricken
with fresh terror," stopped Peter at the moment when he was about to begin his speech, and, taking him aside,
prevailed upon him to tell the result of his mission in a few words, just that the Turks desired battle, and that it
must be prepared for at once. "Forthwith all, from the highest to the lowest, testify the most eager desire to
measure swords with the infidels, and seem to have completely forgotten their miseries, and to calculate upon
victory. All resume their arms, and get ready their horses, their breastplates, their helmets, their shields, and
their swords. It is publicly announced throughout the city that the next morning, before sunrise, every one will
have to be in readiness, and join his host to follow faithfully the banner of his prince."
Next day, accordingly, the 28th of June, 1098, the feast of St. Peter and St. Paul, the whole Christian army
issued from their camp, with a portion of the clergy marching at their head, and chanting the 68th Psalm, "Let
God arise, and let His enemies be scattered!" "I saw these things, I who speak," says one of the chroniclers,
Raymond d'Agiles, chaplain to the count of Toulouse: "I was there, and I carried the spear of the Lord." The
crusaders formed in twelve divisions; and, of all their great chiefs, the count of Toulouse alone was unable to
assume the command of his; he was detained in Antioch by the consequences of a wound, and he had the duty
of keeping in check the Turkish garrison, still masters of the citadel. The crusaders presented the appearance
of old troops ill clad, ill provided, and surmounting by sheer spirit the fatigues and losses of a long war; many
sick soldiers could scarcely march; many barons and knights were on foot; and Godfrey de Bouillon himself
had been obliged to borrow a horse from the count of Toulouse. During the march a gentle rain refreshed
souls as well as bodies, and was regarded as a favor from heaven. Just as the battle was commencing,
Corbogha, struck by the impassioned, stern, and indomitable aspect of the crusaders, felt somewhat
disquieted, and made proposals, it is said, to the Christian princes of what he had refused them the evening
before—a fight between some of their knights and as many Saracens; but they in their turn rejected the
proposition. There is a moment, during great struggles, when the souls of men are launched forth like
bomb-shells, which nothing can stop or cause to recoil. The battle was long, stubborn, and, at some points,
indecisive: Kilidge-Arslan, the indefatigable sultan of Nicaea, attacked Bohemond so briskly, that, save for
the prompt assistance of Godfrey de Bouillon and Tancred, the prince of Antioch had been in great peril. But
the pious and warlike enthusiasm of the crusaders at length prevailed over the savage bravery of the Turks;
and Corbogha, who had promised the khalif of Bagdad a defeat of the Christians, fled away towards the
Euphrates with a weak escort of faithful troops. Tancred pursued till nightfall the sultans of Aleppo and
Damascus and the emir of Jerusalem. According to the Christian chroniclers, one hundred thousand infidels,
and only four thousand crusaders, were left on the field of battle. The camp of the Turks was given over to
pillage; and fifteen thousand camels, and it is not stated how many horses, were carried off. The tent of
Corbogha himself was, for his conquerors, a rich prize and an object of admiration. It was laid out in streets,
flanked by towers, as if it were a fortified town; gold and precious stones glittered in every part of it; it was
capable of containing more than two thousand persons; and Bohemond sent it to Italy, where it was long
preserved. The conquerors employed several days in conveying into Antioch the spoils of the vanquished; and
"every crusader," says Albert of Aix, "found himself richer than he had been at starting from Europe."
It was all at once ascertained that Jerusalem had undergone a fresh calamity, and fallen more and more
beneath the yoke of the infidels. Abou-Kacem, khalif of Egypt, had taken it from the Turks; and his vizier,
Afdhel, had left a strong garrison in it. A sharp pang of grief, of wrath, and of shame shot through the
crusaders. "Could it be," they cried, "that Jerusalem should be taken and retaken, and never by Christians?"
Many went to seek out the count of Toulouse. He was known to be much taken up with the desire of securing
the possession of Marrah, which he had just captured; still great confidence was felt in him. He had made a
vow never to return to the West; he was the richest of the crusader princes; he was conjured to take upon
himself the leadership of the army; to him had been intrusted the spear of the Lord discovered at Antioch; if
the other princes should be found wanting, let him at least go forward with the people, in full assurance; if not,
he had only to give up the spear to the people, and the people would go right on to Jerusalem, with the Lord
for their leader. After some hesitation, Raymond declared that the departure should take place in a fortnight,
and he summoned the princes to a preliminary meeting. On assembling "they found themselves still less at
one," says the chronicler, and the majority refused to budge. To induce them, it is said that Raymond offered
ten thousand sous to Godfrey de Bouillon, the same to Robert of Normandy, six thousand to the count of
Flanders, and five thousand to Tancred; but, at the same time, Raymond announced his intention of leaving a
strong garrison in Marrah to secure its defence. "What!" cried the common folk amongst the crusaders,
"disputes about Antioch and disputes about Marrah! We will take good care there be no quarrel touching this
town; come, throw we down its walls; restore we peace amongst the princes, and set we the count at liberty:
when Marrah no longer exists, he will no longer fear to lose it." The multitude rushed to surround Marrah, and
worked so eagerly at the demolition of its ramparts that the count of Toulouse, touched by this popular feeling
as if it were a proof of the divine will, himself put the finishing touch to the work of destruction and ordered
the speedy departure of the army. At their head marched he, barefooted, with his clergy and the bishop of
Several of the chiefs, hitherto undecided, now followed the popular impulse, whilst others still hesitated. But
on the approach of spring, 1099, more than eight months after the capture of Antioch, Godfrey of Bouillon,
his brother, Eustace of Boulogne, Robert of Flanders, and their following, likewise began to march.
Bohemond, after having accompanied them as far as Laodicea, left them with a promise of rejoining them
before Jerusalem, and returned to Antioch, where he remained. Fresh crusaders arrived from Flanders,
Holland, and England, and amongst them the Saxon prince, Edgar Atheling, who had for a brief interval been
king of England, between the death of Harold and the coronation of William the Conqueror. The army
pursued its way, pretty slowly, still stopping from time to time to besiege towns, which they took and which
the chiefs continued to dispute for amongst themselves. Envoys from the khalif of Egypt, the new holder of
Jerusalem, arrived in the crusaders' camp, with presents and promises from their master. They had orders to
offer forty thousand pieces of gold to Godfrey, sixty thousand to Bohemond, the most dreaded by the
Mussulmans of all the crusaders, and other gifts to divers other chiefs. Aboul-Kacem further promised liberty
of pilgrimage and exercise of the Christian religion in Jerusalem; only the Christians must not enter, unless
unarmed. At this proposal the crusader chiefs cried out with indignation, and declared to the Egyptian envoys
that they were going to hasten their march upon Jerusalem, threatening at the same time to push forward to the
borders of the Nile. At the end of the month of flay, 1099, they were all masse upon the frontiers of Phoenicia
and Palestine, numbering according to the most sanguine calculations, only fifty thousand fighting men.
Upon entering Palestine, as they came upon spots known in sacred history or places of any importance, the
same feelings of greed and jealousy which had caused so much trouble in Asia Minor and Syria caused
divisions once more amongst the crusaders. The chieftain, the simple warrior almost, who was the first to
enter city, or burgh, or house, and plant his flag there halted in it and claimed to be its possessor; whilst those
"whom nothing was dearer than the commandments of God," say the chroniclers, pursued their march,
barefooted, beneath the banner of the cross, deplored the covetousness and the quarrels of their brethren.
When the crusaders arrived a Emmaus, some Christians of Bethlehem came and implore their aid against the
infidels. Tancred was there; and he, with the consent of Godfrey, set out immediately, in the middle of the
night, with a small band of one hundred horsemen, and went and planted his own flag on the top of the church
at Bethlehem at the very hour at which the birth of Jesus Christ had been announced to the shepherds of
Judea. Next day, June 10th 1099, on advancing, at dawn of day, over the heights of Emmaus, the army of the
crusaders had, all at once, beneath their gaze the Holy City.
"Lo! Jerusalem appears in sight. Lo! every hand point, out Jerusalem. Lo! a thousand voices are heard as one
in salutation of Jerusalem.
"After the great, sweet joy which filled all hearts at this first glimpse came a deep feeling of contrition,
mingled with awful and reverential affection. Each scarcely dared to raise the eye towards the city which had
been the chosen abode of Christ, where He died, was buried, and rose again.
"In accents of humility, with words low spoken, with stifled sobs, with sighs and tears, the pent-up yearnings
of a people in joy and at the same time in sorrow sent shivering through the air a murmur like that which is
heard in leafy forests what time the wind blows through the leaves, or like the dull sound made by the sea
which breaks upon the rocks, or hisses as it foams over the beach."
We will not pause over the purely military and technical details of the siege. It was calculated that there were
in the city twenty thousand armed inhabitants and forty thousand men in garrison, the most valiant and most
fanatical Mussulmans that Egypt could furnish. According to William of Tyre, the most judicious and the best
informed of the contemporary historians, "When the crusaders pitched their camp over against Jerusalem,
there had arrived there about forty thousand persons of both sexes, of whom there were at the most twenty
thousand foot, well equipped, and fifteen hundred knights." Raymond d'Agiles, chaplain to the count of
Toulouse, reduces still further to twelve thousand the number of foot capable of bearing arms, and that of the
knights to twelve or thirteen hundred. This weak army was destitute of commissariat and the engines
necessary for such a siege. Before long it was a prey to the horrors of thirst. "The neighborhood of Jerusalem,"
says William of Tyre, "is arid; and it is only at a considerable distance that there are to be found rivulets,
fountains, or wells of fresh water. Even these springs had been filled up by the enemy a little before the arrival
of our troops. The crusaders issued from the camp secretly and in small detachments to look for water in all
directions; and just when they believed they had found some hidden trickier, they saw themselves surrounded
by a multitude of folks engaged in the same search; disputes forthwith arose amongst them, and they
frequently came to blows. Horses, mules, asses, and cattle of all kinds, consumed by heat and thirst, fell down
and died; and their carcasses, left here and there about the camp, tainted the air with a pestilential smell."
Wood, iron, and all the materials needful for the construction of siege machinery were as much to seek as
water. But a warlike and pious spirit made head against all. Trees were felled at a great distance from
Jerusalem; and scaling-towers were roughly constructed, as well as engines for hurling the stones which were
with difficulty brought up within reach of the city. "All ye who read this," says Raymond d'Agiles, "think not
that it was light labor; it was nigh a mile from the spot where the engines, all dismounted, had to be
transported to that where they were remounted." The knights protected against the sallies of the besieged the
workmen employed upon this work. One day Tancred had gone alone to pray on the Mount of Olives and to
gaze upon the holy city, when five Mussulmans sallied forth and went to attack him; he killed three of them,
and the other two took to flight. There was at one point of the city ramparts a ravine which had to be filled up
to make an approach; and the count of Toulouse had proclamation made that be would give a denier to every
one who would go and throw three stones into it. In three days the ravine was filled up. After four weeks of
labor and preparation, the council of princes fixed a day for delivering the assault; but as there had been
quarrels between several of the chiefs, and, notably, between the count of Toulouse and Tancred, it was
resolved that before the grand attack they should all be reconciled at a general supplication, with solemn
ceremonies, for divine aid. After a strict fast, all the crusaders went forth armed from their quarters, and
preceded by their priests, bare-footed and chanting psalms, they moved, in slow procession, round Jerusalem,
halting at all places hallowed by some fact in sacred history, listening to the discourses of their priests, and
raising eyes full of wrath at hearing the scoffs addressed to them by the Saracens, and seeing the insults
heaped upon certain crosses they had set up and upon all the symbols of the Christian faith. "Ye see," cried
Peter the Hermit; "ye hear the threats and blasphemies of the enemies of God. Now this I swear to you by
your faith; this I swear to you by the arms ye carry: to-day these infidels be still full of pride and insolence,
but to-morrow they shall be frozen with fear; those mosques, which tower over Christian ruins, shall serve for
temples to the true God, and Jerusalem shall hear no longer aught but the praises of the Lord." The shouts of
the whole Christian army responded to the hopes of the apostle of the crusade; and the crusaders returned to
their quarters repeating the words of the prophet Isaiah: "So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the
West, and His glory from the rising of the sun."
On the 14th of July, 1099, at daybreak, the assault began at divers points; and next day, Friday, the 15th of
July, at three in the afternoon, exactly at the hour at which, according to Holy Writ, Jesus Christ had yielded
up the ghost, saying, "Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit," Jerusalem was completely in the hands of
the crusaders. We have no heart to dwell on the massacres which accompanied the victory so clearly
Eight or ten days after the capture of Jerusalem, the crusader chiefs assembled to deliberate upon the election
of a king of their prize. There were several who were suggested for it and might have pretended to it. Robert
Shorthose, duke of Normandy, gave an absolute refusal, "liking better," says an English chronicler, "to give
himself up to repose and indolence in Normandy than to serve, as a soldier, the King of kings: for which God
never forgave him." Raymond, count of Toulouse, was already advanced in years, and declared "that he would
have a horror of bearing the name of king in Jerusalem, but that he would give his consent to the election of
anyone else." Tancred was and wished to be only the first of knights. Godfrey de Bouillon the more easily
united votes in that he did not seek them. He was valiant, discreet, worthy, and modest; and his own servants,
being privately sounded, testified to his possession of the virtues which are put in practice without any show.
He was elected King of Jerusalem, and he accepted the burden whilst refusing the insignia. "I will never wear
a crown of gold," he said, "in the place where the Saviour of the world was crowned with thorns." And he
assumed only the title of Defender and Baron of the Holy Sepulchre.
It is a common belief amongst historians that after the capture of Jerusalem, and the election of her king, Peter
the Hermit entirely disappeared from history. It is true that he no longer played an active part, and that, on
returning to Europe, he went into retirement near Huy, in the diocese of Lige, where he founded a monastery,
and where he died on the 11th of July, 1115. But William of Tyre bears witness that Peter's contemporaries
were not ungrateful to him, and did not forget him when he had done his work. "The faithful," says he,
"dwellers at Jerusalem, who, four or five years before had seen the venerable Peter there, recognizing at that
time in the same city him to whom the patriarch had committed letters invoking the aid of the princes of the
West, bent the knee before him, and offered him their respects in all humility. They recalled to mind the
circumstances of his first voyage; and they praised the Lord who had endowed him with effectual power of
speech and with strength to rouse up nations and kings to bear so many and such long toils for love of the
name of Christ. Both in private and in public all the faithful at Jerusalem exerted themselves to render to Peter
the Hermit the highest honors, and attributed to him alone, after God, their happiness in having escaped from
the hard servitude under which they had been for so many years groaning, and in seeing the holy city
recovering her ancient freedom."
END OF VOLUME I.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Popular History of France From The
Earliest Times, by Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
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